How to combine in the future??

[momof3kids]

Hi all!
We are enjoying this first year hs'ing, doing Beyond with my oldest 6yo, and Little Hands with my soon to be 5 yo!...So, just thinking down the road...of combining my younger two children. They are 2 1/2 yrs apart...but how do you get them combined later on, without holding back the older one now??...when my youngest is 5, and brother is 7, was thinking they could combine then. But, what do you do until then? I know I am thinking long term...but there may be #4 on the way....so just thinking ahead of how things could work..lol...thanks a lot!...I love this board, and all the great ladies who give advice!

[MelInKansas]

Is your oldest well-placed? As in, Beyond is offering challenge but not too difficult? How is your oldest at writing? There is a pretty big writing jump from Beyond to Bigger so if your oldest is not kind of "ahead" in writing right now then I think you could hold the oldest one back a little and let the other one catch up. But you may want to think through whether this would really be easiest for you. I used to think that was what I wanted to do, but unless children are pretty close in age and skill levels in most areas, you end up having to adapt a lot for the older one, especially in the lower guides. I think with the older guides there is a much wider range of age and level that can use it, and each child will always do reading and math at their own level. You would want to place your younger child in the guide solidly, they should be old enough and ready for the work, and then you would have to add and beef it up for the older one. My oldest two are 2 years apart and my oldest was not an early reader, whereas my 2nd born showed interest and desire to learn to read at an earlier age. But I still cannot combine them, and at this point I don't think I want to. I can use the guides as written, and that overall saves me a lot of time. Yes, I have more school work to do with them each day, and with a toddler in the house that can be challenging sometimes. But I can see each of my children thriving and learning exactly what they need right now and that to me is working a lot better.

[momof3kids]

My oldest son..6yo..is doing well in Beyond this year...he is an "early reader" and doing the emerging reader set and likes it a lot. I was planning on letting him progress as he can...and possibly combining my next two later on. My second born will be 5 in two weeks, and has some vision issues, but don't seem to hinder him in any way right now. He is doing LHTH, we just finished unit 20, he is able to write his letters A-P while I hold up the flash card for him, and did a good job. There are 2 1/2 yrs between my second, and third born...little sister. I know there is no way to really tell what each child's skill level will be down the road, but I was just wondering how you do combine without holding back the older child until the younger is ready to join...? I am now figuring out my plan for my second son for K, and looking down the road......thanks for all your input!

[MelInKansas]

Since you do need to place with the younger child, you do have to "hold back" the older one or find other things they can do. Or go through LHFHG or something twice. There is so much richness in each guide and extensions that add to what is learned so the older one will learn a lot also and combining works well for many families. Then there are others who just place each child in their own guide and I think I fall into that category.

[my3sons]

My oldest son..6yo..is doing well in Beyond this year...he is an "early reader" and doing the emerging reader set and likes it a lot. I was planning on letting him progress as he can...and possibly combining my next two later on. My second born will be 5 in two weeks, and has some vision issues, but don't seem to hinder him in any way right now. He is doing LHTH, we just finished unit 20, he is able to write his letters A-P while I hold up the flash card for him, and did a good job. There are 2 1/2 yrs between my second, and third born...little sister. I know there is no way to really tell what each child's skill level will be down the road, but I was just wondering how you do combine without holding back the older child until the younger is ready to join...? I am now figuring out my plan for my second son for K, and looking down the road......thanks for all your input!

It honestly sounds like things are going so well already! I don't think I'd hold back your oldest, and it sounds like you aren't thinking along those lines anyway. As far as slowing down your 5 yo - he is already in Unit 20 of LHTH and doing well. I don't think you'd want to hold him back for the lengthy time for little 2 yo sweetie to catch up to him. You actually have a pretty good thing going here. Instead of slowing 5 yo down... and it would have to be waaaaaaaaay down for 2 yo to catch up, why not just keep going, and if you need to at any time, slow to half-speed for either your oldest or your second oldest? I did this. When life got crazy busy, because my dc are on the youngest side of the target age range for each guide, I have lots of wiggle room to slow things down if needed. What I did is alternate having my second and third born sons go half-speed, while my oldest has always gone full-speed (he's a go-getter and a natural first-born leader, so this works better all around). So, last year, my 5 yo did LHFHG full-speed, and my 9 yo did CTC half-speed (my oldest did MTMM full-speed). This year, my 6 yo is doing Beyond Little Hearts half-speed or about 3 days of plans a week, and my 10 yo is doing CTC full-speed. We are about to make the switch where my 6 yo will be doing Beyond full-speed as he'll be a third into it and as my 10 1/2 yo will be finished with CTC, and starting RTR half-speed. This alternating pacing has been such a blessing, as there is much going on in my life right now. So, I am thinking that it would be WONDERFUL for you if you could do this sort of alternating half-speed and full-speed with your two oldest or even your middle two as needed. I think I'd start LHTH with your youngest dd when she is 4 yo, then, if you have another little blessing at that point that is say around 2 yo, that child could be combined with 4 yo and you could take it slowly with those 2 dc. I know this is not exactly what you were thinking, but what are your thoughts on it?

In Christ,
Julie

[momof3kids]

Hi Julie,
Thanks so much for the input! Like you mentioned, my oldest son, which is 6yo now is doing well in Beyond, and I plan on progressing him as needed...he is the go-getter. But, I like the idea of progressing my second son, but maybe doing half speed at times. I hadn't really thought of that. I appreciate the outline you mentioned you have done with your children. I just really want him to have a good foundation for his "K" year. We pulled my oldest out of ps after K, so I didn't teach him that year. Just a little nervous about starting from scratch, I guess. This has been our first year hs'ing and it has really went well. Both of my boys often say they are glad they are not in ps ( I think because we are usually done by 11 or so, and they have rest of day to play..lol) I do really like the Bible focus of HOD, and we are all learning so much. So, anyway...I got off topic...lol...
would you suggest starting LHFGH half speed when my second finishing LHTH (around June after we take a few weeks off)...or jump in all the way and see how he does, then slow down if he needs??...I do think slowing him down to be with little sis may be more trouble than its worth...just the thought of doing 3, or possibly 4 guides seems a little scary!

Since we are pretty new to this, I don't have any experience with LHFHG...what is it like??....say in comparison to LHTH or Beyond, which we are doing now?...also, does LHFHG give a good phonics base?...my oldest son was reading in K (he was pretty ahead in his class), and has done well with emerging readers... I know all children are different, but hoping to give my second son a good start as well.

Sorry if this sounds a little confusing!

LHTH has been so sweet for him..he loves the Bible stories, and he always hugs me and says he loves me, and talks about loving Jesus.....which really is the most important foundation of all!

[MelInKansas]

LHFHG is obviously somewhere in between. There is less work than Beyond. Each day the child does History, Storytime, Math, Phonics, Fine Motor workbooks, Bible (memory verses), Rhyme in Motion (kind of like LHTH but with gross motor and reminders about the history you study), there's a rotating activity which can be art, science, geography, a game. Phonics is your choice, both of the HOD recommended resources are easy to use and get children reading quickly without having to do a lot of writing.

I am not to the point of doing 3 or 4 guides yet but it seems a lot more do-able now than it did when I was at your stage. Children become more independent as they grow, so even though there is a lot more work to do I do not have to be there for every minute of it now (with my oldest). Also I have the help of older children to play with little ones and help things go more smoothly. I also find the guides are so easy to use when the child fits right in the guide without modification. That alone saves me so much time in planning I am sure it offsets the time spent reading aloud for several guides (which I love to do anyway).

Well OK I am doing 3 guides technically but LHTH hardly counts and we are doing it super slow, it will take 2 years by the time we are done.

[momof3kids]

Thanks so much!..that is a very helpful breakdown of what Little Hearts is like....
and in my opinion, it still counts as 3 guides..no matter what speed you are going at ..lol

[MelInKansas]

It counts. LHTH is a guide and it is some work for me to do. I have started and stopped it several times and my DD is really ready to keep at it full speed! But then again, she is only 4 so I don't want to get through it so quickly. She does several other workbooks, mazes, cutting and pasting, and can trace her name very well and almost write it even without tracing. I love LHTH! It is so much fun.

[my3sons]

I really like the flexibility of being able to go half-speed now and then too!

...Since we are pretty new to this, I don't have any experience with LHFHG...what is it like??....say in comparison to LHTH or Beyond, which we are doing now?...also, does LHFHG give a good phonics base?...my oldest son was reading in K (he was pretty ahead in his class), and has done well with emerging readers... I know all children are different, but hoping to give my second son a good start as well.

As far as LHFHG, MelInKansas did a good job of comparing it to LHTH. I'll just add that each side of the plans of LHFHG takes us about 30-45 minutes to do, resulting in about 1 hour and 15 minutes or 1 1/2 hours for the whole day's plans. The LHTH's Letter activities and fingerplays that taught a sound for each letter really helped prepare each of our dc nicely for phonics instruction. We also had our dc watch the Leap Frog Letter Factory videos now and then, which also helped. You are right - each child is different, and often times, the oldest child seems to take off more quickly (probably because they were our only child for awhile ).

Sorry if this sounds a little confusing!

LHTH has been so sweet for him..he loves the Bible stories, and he always hugs me and says he loves me, and talks about loving Jesus.....which really is the most important foundation of all!
We loved LHTH too! Isn't is a super start to homeschooling? I am excited for you to start LHFHG though. You'll enjoy that too. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie