New decisions...Bigger for a 9yo (soon to be 10)?

[Sue G in PA]

Okay, so here is my new dilemna. After visiting the Elementary school today, both my husband and I have decided that we will NOT be sending our 9yo there for 4th grade. Yikes...how does a school change so much in 4 yrs.? Anyway...that throws a wrench into my plans for next year! I had decided on Beyond for my 8yo and 6yo but this will certainly be too easy for my 9yo (10 in Oct.). He is a bright child as well, advanced or on target in math, reading, grammar, writing, etc. He could do well in Preparing however...I really want to focus on American History next year b/c we just did Creation through Rome last year and the year before that he did Rome through ? with a cyber academy. We're sick of early world history. My question....would Bigger be too easy for him? I must combine most of my children to make it easy on me. I will be taking 2 Masters classes next Fall and as I said, have an 8yo, 6yo and 3yo to teach as well as a toddler to keep after. So...I'm thinking that Bigger could work for the 9yo and 8yo but what about my 6yo? Should I just let him listen in and do his own thing with Math and LA as I had planned? He could certainly do some things with MFW K w/ my 3yo. I don't think I want to attempt to do another HOD program with him yet. Please help me? I'm so confused! If I did another HOD program with him, I'd likely not do MFW K with my 3yo b/c I can't do everything! I'd just try to combine him and my 3yo in the HOD program. Does that make sense? HELP!

[Tree House Academy]

I think he would be fine in Bigger. I have a 9 year old who will be 10 in August that will start Bigger with the Extensions in the fall. However, I would not put him in Bigger and the youngers in Beyond. Instead, I would probably put the 8 year old in Bigger with the 10 year old (only no extensions for the 8 y/o) and then do Little Hearts with your 6 year old. The reason for this is so you do not end up doing the same guide year after year after year (major burnout) and also because your ages fall better on the placement chart this way.

Best of luck in whatever you choose.

[momontheprairie]

I am curious too. I was told that Bigger would be fine for my 11 year old with extentions. I am adding higher level science, math, and English/Latin so I would imagine it would work for you too. Hopefully, someone in the know will help us newbies.

[Riversidemom3]

Hi,

I just wanted to say that Bigger is great for your oldest. This is my first year with Bigger and I combined my dd and ds. They were 9 and 7 at the beginning of the school year. It has been a great year for us combining 2nd and 4th grade with everything but Math and English. I don't have experience in the younger years with HOD but others will along to answer you. The hardest part is placement. Once that is accomplished you can be at peace knowing you will have a wonderful year and great families on this board to share your journey with.

Jeri

[Carrie]

Sue,

Adding another kiddo to your school day can really change our best-laid plans, can't it! Seriously though, in helping you talk through a totally new scenario, I'd love to have you take another good look at the placement chart and tell me where each of your kiddos falls on the chart individually. Pay the most attention to the first page on the chart, as that makes the most difference in placement.

I actually have quite a few possible placement options running through my head right now, so I'll need your thoughts on language arts and math placement to guide me in advising better. Here's a link to the chart: http://www.heartofdakota.com/placing-your-child.php

I also need to know how each of your kiddos feel about writing, how much grammar they've had, how well they each read and listen to chapter book style read-alouds, and whether you'll be using HOD for math or not.

I'll look forward to hearing back from you when you get a chance.

Blessings,
Carrie

[Sue G in PA]

Thanks, Carrie! Here is the rundown of where my kids place individually:

ds9 - falls btwn Preparing and Hearts through Time. He can copy long passages, take short dictation, compose original sentences and be creative, knows cursive and can do copywork in cursive, has a general idea of the basic parts of speech (noun, verb, adj., adv.) but has not done diagramming thus far. As for reading, he can read chapter books and listen to chapter book read-alouds when interested. He could do DITHOR 4/5. He is in Singapore 3A right now and does mental math very well.

ds8 - would probably place into Beyond. As he is my challenge child...I don't want to overwhelm him. He can copy simple passages and take very simple dictation, but he despises writing. He's not had a ton of formal grammar so far...probably only noun, verb, adjective. He will be starting cursive next week. He is a strong reader, knows phonics, can read chapter books and listen to chapter read-alouds...again...when interested! He is in Singapore 1B right now and just starting to cement his facts.

ds6 - knows his letters/sounds, can write his letters, copy short passages (like short Bible verses). He can sound out CVC words fairly well but is not reading yet. He does well in math and has gone through most of Saxon 1 this year and will do a grade 1 workbook that I have left over from when my older son was in a K12 academy (I can't waste money!).

dd3 - knows letters/sounds as well or better than ds6, is beginning to write her letters w/out help. She hasn't done copywork or formal math, obviously!

Here are my concerns: I simply cannot spread myself too thin and do 3 different programs. I have MFW K already and would like to use that for dd3. My budget is not huge for homeschooling! We've done Ancient History ad nauseum and I'd really like to do American with the boys. We probably will not follow the HOD math strictly and I'm not sure about the LA. I've used R&S and didn't care for it, but I might give it another try. Not sure...see my other LA choices post Thanks for all your help and let me know what you think!

[Lynnw]

Hi Sue! It's nice to see you here. I'm "Another Lynn" on WTMBoards though I haven't been there lately. I remember when we were both preggo and looking forward to delivering. My baby is 9mos old now, so if I remember correctly your ds is older than that? - 1 year? Where does the time go???

I know Carrie will come back with some good ideas for you, but thought I would tell you that if one of those options is doing Beyond with all of your dc, I could see that working. I just started Preparing with my oldest 3 weeks ago (and I did it because I felt I needed help getting his skills ready to go into CTC sometime next fall, before Christmas. In other words, we might not do all of Preparing... but I digress....) My point is that before I put him in Preparing he was hanging around for our Beyond readings, projects, poetry, and Bible (basically the "left side") and enjoying it. He was doing different grammar, and math, as well as additional reading and writing assignments (sometimes pages in a state notebook). (He was also in Classical Conversations where he had presentations, memory work, additional science, and art.) In hind sight, I could have kept him doing this to finish out the year, but I was nervous about whether he had the skills to start CTC in the fall. Now that I have Preparing in hand, I see how nicely it has increased his copywork, dictation, narration - I'm not second guessing myself and I have more confidence in what I'm asking of him if he starts to complain. I know you have years more experience than I do and could probably adjust Beyond to your 4th grader with confidence. I might be able to do it if I need to again someday now that I've seen the workload in Preparing.... but I had just never walked this way before, never had a 4th grader before, and wasn't sure how much to push and how much to relax.

Anyway, I'll look forward to reading Carrie's recommendations for you and pray you'll have a peace about what will work best for your family.

Blessings,
Lynn

[Carrie]

Sue,

Thanks so much for sharing more about your kiddos! More information helps so much when giving advice.

To me, it sounds like your oldest would fit well within Preparing Hearts and your 6 and 8 year old still fit best in Beyond. If I'm understanding it correctly, you also have another pair of kiddos (ages 3 and 1) coming up eventually who will also need some of their busy momma's time. So, in looking down the road a bit, I see a couple of options for you.

One good option that Lynn already shared, would be to think of this year as a transitional year to set you up in HOD for the years to come. To do that you would place your 6, 8, and 9 year olds together in Beyond Little Hearts for the left side of the plans and the storytime from the right side of the plans. In this scenario, your 6 and 8 year old would use Beyond as is, however your 9 year old would need some modifications. For your 9 year old, you would add the right side of the Preparing Hearts guide (only for the dictation passages, the English 3 grammar schedule, the math 3B/4A schedule in the Appendix, and the daily science with books). You could weigh whether to add the creative writing poetry lessons from the right side of Preparing as well, if you felt your 9 year old needed creative writing. You would also add either DITHR Level 2/3 or Level 4/5 depending on how your 9 year old feels about written work. From the sound of it, he does fine with written work, so I'd lean toward DITHR Level 4/5. I would also make sure that he does a written narration on your history reading at least once a week, and twice a week would be even better. This would up the level of all areas for your 9 year old and still allow you to keep your kiddos together. It would also set you up for Bigger Hearts the following year (with the target age range on that guide being ages 7-9 with extensions for ages 10-11).

If this scenario does not appeal to you, a different scenario would be to place your 6 and 8 year old within Beyond Little Hearts and your 9 year old in Preparing Hearts. This is also a doable plan. It is what we'll be doing at our house next year. However, it will take more work to adjust to doing 2 programs in the beginning and will leave you less time to focus on doing DITHR, English, and writing. I was still weighing whether your 9 year old could go into CTC (which is more independent) but I think he truly places best in Preparing Hearts. So, I think you could lose some of the independence of CTC if you jumped your 9 year old up into CTC too quickly. If needed you could do both Beyond and Preparing Hearts at half-speed for awhile doing the left side of the plans one day and the right the next until you hit your stride. Then, you'd most likely bump up one of the programs to full-speed first, and then the next one later.

I want you to sincerely enjoy this change to HOD and for it to be just the breath of fresh air that I know it can be! One last thought is that if you did begin with your 6, 8, and 9 year old in Beyond (with your 9 year old doing the right side only of Preparing), if you felt that it wasn't enough for your 9 year old, you could easily jump him up to all of Preparing Hearts by adding just the rest of the Economy Pack (as you'd already have much of the rest of Preparing for the right side anyway). That way you'd have a great back-up plan too.

If you get a chance to pop back in and let me know what you're thinking that would be great!

Blessings,
Carrie

[Sue G in PA]

Carrie, thank you so much for laying out those options for me. I see why you wouldn't recommend Bigger for next year. Here are some of my thoughts/concerns about each scenario (bear with me as I ramble a bit )

1. I am leaning toward putting them all in Beyond. It is perfect for ds6 and ds8. However, it does look a bit easy for my 9yo (soon to be 10) all around. I feel quite certain I could beef it up (adding more written narrations, dictation, having him read more, etc. Plus, he needs Amer. Hist in elem. as per PA state homeschool regs and he has not had that yet. I do not know if I can afford to purchase 2 programs...so to use Preparing for just the right side makes sense academically but financially it would take a miracle (I know God is still in the miracle business...so we shall see ) I'm trying to use as much of what I already have as possible so I do not have to buy too much. I could just use our own LA program and he is already doing Singapore and that way I won't need Preparing.

2. Doing 2 programs at once, PLUS doing MFW K with dd3 (even doing it at half speed as she'll only be 4 next year) seems like a lot on my plate. How doable is it to do 2 HOD programs at once?

3. My 2 older children return to public school next year. We are looking to, most likely, send the younger children to school once they hit middle school (5th or perhaps 6th) unless they are thriving at home and enjoying homeschooling. I'm pursuing my Masters in Prof. Counseling (taking 6 credits each semester) and looking to reenter the workforce as a counselor (part-time) in 5 years or so. That might throw another wrench in the plans. In planning ahead using HOD programs...that makes it difficult b/c I want to cover the areas they will not cover in public school. I'd love for each of them to get through Preparing before entering middle school to have at least an overview of world history (they don't study that in public school until high school).

Here is another wacky idea. If I did Preparing with ds9, Beyond with ds6 & 8 next year, how would it work to then do Bigger with all 3 the following year? Would it be crazy to backtrack with ds9 (Preparing first and then Bigger?). Is that doable? Crazy? This is assuming we do not put ds9 in ps for the 2010/11 school year. Ugh...I'm feeling so overwhelmed. I do not want next year to be stressful. I tried doing too much this year, gave up half of it b/c I got too overwhelmed and nobody had a good year.

OKay, somebody set me straight. Please help me! 2 big concerns to spell out: Ds9 needing some American History before he is out of elem. grades AND the finances to purchase more than 1 program plus all the extras! AAAGGGGHHH!

[Carrie]

Sue,

With what you've shared about your past year and the fact that you're taking master's classes, which I can relate to as to how much work those involve, I'd still lean toward the combining within Beyond (and beefing it up for your older child). To make that work, you could keep going with your own language arts and math as long as you have literature study covered (otherwise you'd need to add DITHR for sure) and as long as you have science covered (otherwise you need to add Preparing Hearts for the upped science portion of the guide).

If you did end up going the Preparing Hearts right side of the guide route, you'd only need to purchase the Preparing Hearts guide and the Preparing Hearts science package. Then, within the Preparing Hearts guide you could still use the Rod and Staff English schedule, the dictation passages in the Appendix, and the poetry/creative writing lessons provided within the guide, and even the Psalm study for your 9 year old if you choose to use it (which are all located right within the Preparing Hearts guide and are not linked with the history). If you used Rod and Staff, you'd add that on as well.

Beyond is a very economical program, so you actually wouldn't need to add much to make this plan work, especially if you plan to use the library for your DITHR books. Anyway, just some more brainstorming. This would be a transitional year that would set you up well for the following year in Bigger Hearts.

I personally find it quite easy to use 2 programs in a school day (we actually did 3 this past year), however you know your needs best, and it's important to find the best fit for you. Sometimes it's a relief not to tweak a program and just open-and-go for each kiddo even if that means using two guides. That is why we do separate programs at our house. If you do go the two program route, it would be good to start at half-speed with both and ease on it. We'll be doing Beyond and Preparing ourselves this year and are looking forward to it. Either way, I think you'll find HOD easy to use and a joy to teach.

Blessings,
Carrie

[Sue G in PA]

Thanks for helping me brainstorm this, Carrie. I went to bed entirely too overwhelmed last night. This year isn't even over and I'm already overwhelmed thinking about next. Combining would probably work best. Will the History in Beyond be enough for my 9yo? That's all I worry about now. I realized that I have a bunch of the books for Preparing science and some from the Economy pack so if I decided to do both I wouldn't need very much more. As for Science, I have CKE Earth and Space and an Apologia book (Flying Creatures) so I can always use those for him for Science. I also have DITHOR 4/5. I'm not sure which LA I will use b/c I didn't care for R&S when we used it, wasn't thrilled with PLL or ILL...I might just stick w/ this workbook I have from Exercises in English and use the copywork/dictation from Preparing. I don't know. Thanks for all your help in figuring this out.

[Carrie]

Sue,

The books used for the history portion of Beyond come from CLP's grades 3, 4, and 5 in their catalog as readers for the student. So, they will be on target interest-wise for your 9 year old, even though you'll be reading them aloud. Depending on your son's personality type some of the activities within Beyond may be on the young-feeling side, however I will say that my own oldest son still loves to jump in with my littles and do the "fun" activities even though they're technically "beneath" him. The storytime lessons in Beyond are also very solid for teaching literature study skills, and will probably stretch your 6 and 8 year olds a bit, being fine for your 9 year old.

The science will definitely not be enough, so you'll want to either add the programs you mentioned that you already have for science or go with the Preparing Hearts science. I'm biased, but I would lean toward having your 9 year old do the science in Preparing Hearts, because it is written right to the student to do independently and includes short bite-sized lessons and readings each day. The programs you mentioned owning for science do take a bit of work and presentation by the teacher, so I'm thinking with your busy schedule it would be good to move toward a more independent science for your older son instead if possible. Just something to consider.

I agree that you could keep going with the grammar that you're doing if you prefer it over Rod and Staff. I would really go into this upcoming year with the mentality that you are on a transitional year, working hard on keeping your kiddos 3 R's in place and giving your kiddos good solid coverage in history and science. Then, the next year they can all head into Bigger Hearts together and be a group as they move through the HOD guides.

And, of course, with you owning many of the Preparing Hearts books, you would have a great back-up plan in place if needed to bump your son up to all of Preparing Hearts.

Blessings,
Carrie

[Alison in KY]

I just wanted to assure you that my recently turned 10 year old is loving the history RA's in Beyond. He also enjoys the storytime portion of it. He's getting alot out of it, more than the more age appropriate kids are getting from it. We do our own LA's and math, so the right side isn't an issue with us. I think it sounds like the best choice,then you can just keep them all together going up through the HOD packages. You can always beef a program up for your oldest if you want to, but I don't think it's necessary except for the LA"s and math. I am also having my oldest read the science RA meant to be read by me, to himself. I think it's by Christian Liberty Press.

Alison

[Sue G in PA]

Thanks again Carrie and Angela. Sounds like Beyond is the best choice. That is good to know, Carrie, that Science is independent in Preparing. Science usually falls by the way side here when I'm too tired to do it. Independent study would be a plus. The programs I mentioned do take some teacher prep, obviously...I only thought of them b/c I already owned them. In a perfect world, I'd like to transition solely to HOD, however, money is a big concern right now so unless I can sell a bunch of old curriculum, I'm not sure how we'll swing purchasing another program. But, where there is a will, there is a way! Plus, as you mentioned, Preparing could be a good back-up plan. So....lots of thinking to do. At least the main one is made...Beyond it is! Yeah!