Repeating parts of Beyond?

[crlacey]

Here's my confession that I hate to admit.

I have a DD who has partially completed Beyond though we skipped around since I was an unsure mom listening to those around me. Should I start the guide over this year since we skipped around through parts of it, or should I just find a spot toward the second half that we haven't covered and start there? She says she doesn't mind reading some of it again and I could do some notebooking pages with her this time around.
I bought Bigger thinking I'd just cut our losses on Beyond. But I'm afraid that she's not going to be ready for all the writing in Bigger since she's been a struggling reader until just recently. I could cut out some of the writing, but would that leave me always simplifying the assignments for other guides too?
Any thoughts?

Here's her info:
7 yr old 2nd grader
currently finishing the Bible from the Emerging readers
knows nouns and verbs, capitalization, punctuation and can write/copy 2 sentences
very little spelling instruction
uses a different math so that's not a consideration in placement

[GinainMD]

Hello! I certainly can sympathize with you about getting off track . In your situation I would go through Beyond again as it sounds like Bigger would be a stretch for your dd who seems to be blossoming now. I'm using Beyond now for a seven and eight year old and it has been plenty. HTH

[John'smom]

I think I would do Beyond too, but I'm new to HOD. We are using Beyond now with a new 8 and 6 year old. I've added some things for my 8 yr. old (you can see in my signature), but if I had a 7 year old I wouldn't worry about adding anything. Just do it all fully. We are having such a great time. You can see our first week of fun here.

[pjdobro]

We did Beyond last year for 2nd grade and it was a nice fit. My dc turned 8 in May as we were finishing Beyond so that gives you an idea of where we were at age wise. We did use R&S2 with Beyond because we had already done the language arts section of Beyond the year before. It sounds like your dd might be ready for R&S2 grammar as well. I would definitely go ahead with Beyond. There are a lot of wonderful things in there that I'm sure you wouldn't want to miss. It would be nice too for you to not have to be modifying the assignments and it sounds like Beyond might be a better fit overall right now. As far as where to start, that is a bit harder. I don't think it would hurt to repeat some of Beyond especially if you didn't complete all of the activities that went with it. Did you do most of the pilgrims last year? I'm thinking if you did, you could just start right after that section and not repeat Stories of the Pilgrims. I think that would start you around week 14 or so if I remember correctly. What parts did you cover and did you do all of the activities with it?

[my3sons]

We've all had moments of feeling pressured by well-meaning (or not-so-well-meaning ) people in our lives in regard to homeschooling. I too think your little gal would do very well with Beyond, but I'd love to hear your answers to these wise questions, as they'll help us chat through what would be best to do next with dd...

...What parts did you cover and did you do all of the activities with it?

In Christ,
Julie

[Tree House Academy]

Here's her info:
7 yr old 2nd grader
currently finishing the Bible from the Emerging readers
knows nouns and verbs, capitalization, punctuation and can write/copy 2 sentences
very little spelling instruction
uses a different math so that's not a consideration in placement

We did Units 1-8 last year in Beyond with my son who was a 6 year old 1st grader (Sept '03) this year. He was just not ready, so we dropped back and did Little Hearts for the rest of the year. We finished that up this summer and went back to Beyond this year with him being a 7 year old, 2nd grader. This year, the difference is amazing. Other than him being an emerging reader (he was actually an "early" reader and is now reading at 4th or 5th grade level, so we do DITHR there), he is exactly where your dd is. He can write 2-6 sentences in copywork, but I only require 2 per day of poetry copywork (since he is also doing writing with spelling, math, etc as well).

I would absolutely suggest starting over in Beyond this year and doing the whole thing in the order it was planned. I think you will see it is a big difference when you use it as written.

[crlacey]

What parts did you cover and did you do all of the activities with it?

We covered a bunch of units (1-22?) using the reading about history and the rotating box under it (science/activity). We didn't use too many poems or storytime boxes since DH was in charge of storytime last year.
Although I wish I could just start over and do it right this time, I guess my best bet would be to pick up there and finish out the guide then move into Bigger sometime in January.

[my3sons]

I do think you can just start there and finish it out, doing all of it with a flourish so dd can be well equipped for Bigger Hearts next. That way you'll have over a third of Beyond to use as a training ground for the skills in Bigger Hearts. I would do them all though as I'm finding we needed every one for Bigger Hearts with our middle ds.

In Christ,
Julie

[MomtoJGJE]

I might back up and do the full second half of Beyond to get her prepared for Bigger. We used Beyond for DD1 year before last all the way through, except I left things out. Like we didn't do copywork or emerging readers all the way through or storytime.... I think we did about half the Bible and math. We did all the history and rotating box, and spelling/LA with list 1...

This past year we did it again and did it as written, except I did A Reason for Handwriting A instead of copywork because she was having trouble with formation of letters and wanted to do a handwriting book. I made her copy things occasionally just for the practice.

So even with having done ALL of Beyond's history the year before she still really enjoyed it this year and learned a ton. It went so smoothly when I actually did it as written compared to when I picked and chose what I wanted to do. She just finished a couple of weeks ago and we are taking the fall off to let her mature into Bigger a little more as far as writing and reading goes. We will start DITHOR and do at least one genre this fall and maybe do two if it goes well.

[Carrie]

Crystal,

You really could do any of the options that the ladies suggested, as they are all good options. I would be likely to lean toward doing all of Beyond as written this year from the beginning to the end to make sure your child is really prepared for Bigger Hearts. However, part of this decision will also rest with how you as the teacher feels about repeating parts of the guide you've done already. In my life, I find that if I am not excited about a plan, it doesn't get done consistently like it should! So, with that in mind, if you can get excited about the option of teaching Beyond all the way through as written, I'd go that route. If you feel less than enthused about that plan, I would start at the halfway point or a bit beyond that and teach it as written through to the end.

Blessings,
Carrie