Using only the History in RTR?

[mom@home]

Help! I've gotten myself into a pickle! I have one ds10 (he'll be 11 in August, 5th grade next year) and one dd 9 (4th grade next year). We used HOD Bigger last school year and had a great year, but I decided I would like to try to put together my own curriculum for the current school year using Mystery of History 1 for history so that's what we did. After doing that for a year, I've decided it was really nice to have it all pulled together for me . So, if I were to go by the guide and place my children where they fit best age wise we would be in CTC in the fall. However, we just spent an entire year in that time period and we're ready to move on. Is there any way we could use RTR and use only the history, science, Bible portions and not be overwhelmed? We already have our math and language arts in place and I'm sticking with what we're using for that anyway.
Any help is welcome!
Thanks,
Robin

[blessedmomof4]

Hi Robin,
Have you looked at the placement chart? http://www.heartofdakota.com/placing-your-child.php Success in Heart of Dakota relies on proper placement, rather than period of history. Each guide builds on the skills learned in the last. The placement chart is very accurate, especially considering more heavily the areas of reading, writing, and grammar. Even if you are using diferent language arts and reading, their skills in those areas can weigh in on their success with the other subjects.
If it turns out that one of both of your sweeties place in CTC skillwise, be assured that it will not feel like a repeat of anything you have done. Carrie, the author, has a unique way of "pulling it together" that is exciting, challenging, and fun, yet doesn't give you a long day. I believe CTC is supposed to take about 4 to 4 1/2 hours a day (although that time may be longer if you are using your own language arts and math) and is largely independent for the student, once you and your children get into the groove of things. My two will be using CTC soon, and I am buying two guides so each child can use it as her own.
Pop in later after you've looked at the chart, and we'll be happy to help you think it through!

[pjdobro]

I'm thinking in your case, you might be better off to go back to Preparing instead of RTR if you really don't want to repeat ancient history. I know that Preparing does cover some ancient history but it is done in more of an overview fashion. What I'm concerned about for you is the skills that your dc will have missed in the Preparing guide and the CTC guide like written narrations, doing the independent history and science, research, Bible quiet time, etc. All of those skills (and probably more that I'm forgetting) are introduced and practiced in those guides. By RTR they will be expected to be able to use those skills and do many of the activities independently. If they don't yet have those skills and you have to make some of those independent boxes into teacher boxes, the program is going to take much longer on a daily basis. Perhaps if you do choose to try RTR, you could start it half pace and work on bringing their skills up to the level they need to be independent in the guide. Maybe if you take some time working on that, then after a while you would be up to speed and ready to take the program as written.

I know it's probably difficult to think of repeating that history time again, but like Lourdes said it will feel different doing it with HOD. Even if some of the books are the same, they will be used differently. Have you taken a look at the week in review at some of the projects that those doing CTC have done? It's amazing the wonderful paintings their dc are doing, the notebook pages, and fun activities that I see them completing. It really looks like a wonderful program and even though it is covering a similar time period to what you have already done, you might not want to miss it. Here's a link to the HOD photobook for CTC for you to look at too: http://heartofdakotasphotobooks.shutterfly.com/31

[mom@home]

Thank you, Patty and Blessedmomof4. I did look at the placement guide and my children are definitely placing more in CTC. I was just wondering if I used RTR if I could read aloud some of the books to them and make it work. I'm sure it would add time to the day. If I went back to Preparing would you recommend skipping CTG the following year since we covered that?
Thanks for helping me think through this.
Robin

[pjdobro]

I'm not sure how you could best handle it. I'm thinking if you did do Preparing this year, you might be able to work specifically on getting the skills in place that would be needed for RTR and be able to do that the following year. It might be better to to try to do RTR at a slower pace now. I'm not really for sure since we haven't done these levels yet. Julie or Carrie or perhaps one of the other ladies that has done all of these levels will be able to tell you the progression of skills specifically and perhaps which would work best. I know most everyone is probably going to recommend to do CTC since that is where your dc place, but if you really don't want to do that, hopefully they can offer more detailed instructions on how you can either use Preparing or RTR. Julie and Carrie are at a conference this weekend so hopefully early next week, they'll be able to pop in an offer some advice. In the meantime, you could try looking over the first week and introduction of each of the 3 programs, if you haven't already, and see what is asked of the students in each one. That would probably give you a better idea of how much of a jump in skills it might be for your dc to do RTR and what skills you might even be able to begin working on now to make that jump in the Fall.

[mom@home]

Just bumping this up hoping Carrie will answer or to get a little more feedback from others.

[my3sons]

The jump from Bigger Hearts to RTR is B-I-G! Oh my, oh my, I cannot imagine making that leap, even with a year under my belt. We are actually doing Bigger Hearts and RTR right now, and the learning curve is immense. I'm so glad you took a careful look at the placement chart, as that is the best way to choose what to do. The guides are all excellent, but truly the best tool for choosing which one to use is the placement chart. I do realize you have done CTC's time period recently, but that guide is so much more than just a time period - it is an incredibly rich guide full of so much that you don't want to miss it! I guarantee, it will be different from what you've done - I've seen nothing like it anywhere. Especially if that's the right placement for your dc. As difficult as it is, I would definitely choose the guide that best fits your dc skillwise. If you begin RTR tweaking it by reading things the dc should be reading, modifying the writing, shortening the assignments, skipping things, you will basically be doing this the whole way through from this point forward. It is so short-changing what the guides are meant to be, and I fear that your dc will never really get the full benefit of the guides, nor learn all of the skills they need to, over the years. If you absolutely feel that you cannot do CTC, then PHFHG would be the next best choice. I so understand what you are saying here, and I know the historical time period seems so very important, but keeping your dc's hearts, teaching them the necessary skills they need to be successful, and moving them along in their academics in an incremental way really gives them an incredible education! HTH as you consider what you'd like to do - it would be easy to say, "Sure, go ahead and do RTR", but I've decided long ago an honest answer is far better than a contrived one. I just care too much about wanting HOD to be a big success in your home - happy moms, happy children, that is an incredible result of proper placement... and it pays dividends in the form of joy and contentment all year long.

In Christ,
Julie

[mom@home]

Thanks for your honest opinion, Julie. I had a feeling that's what you would say . I am really struggling with repeating that time period, but I completely understand what you're saying about them not being ready for RTR. We're taking a spring break next week so hopefully I will have a chance to look more closely at CTG and continue to pray about which program would be best.
Thanks!
Robin

[lmercon]

I would have to say that placement trumps historical time period as far as choosing which program to use. Here is something to consider. It is only March. What if you dropped history all together right now. Place your focus on some fun science units. With spring here, it might be nice to have extra time outdoors exploring natural science. Maybe take a couple of museum field trips. Do some stuff that you've been wanting to do but haven't had time for because of regular studies. If you don't start CTC until the fall, that will be over five months from now! That's a nice long break away from the historical studies you are doing presently. Plus, you will have the bonus of doing it the HOD way, which is so varied, interesting, and fun.
hth,
Laura

[Motherjoy]

I really do think you could use the history in RTR and be fine. We skipped CTC because it took so long for us to complete Preparing and we didn't want to spend anymore time on Ancients. Just modify as you see fit. I LOVE HOD, but we don't use it as written. We mainly use if for History and Science. We don't do the History projects, we skip experiments usually, unless my son is really interested.

[mom@home]

Hummm...Two different options for me to think about, motherjoy and Laura . Thanks for the suggestions. I wish I could see both TMs, but Carrie is not coming to my state this year .

[momtofive]

In reading this thread just now, I thought maybe I'd share a little about how our year with HOD is going. Last August I started my 10 yr. old, fifth grade son in CTC. This was our first time using HOD. Skill-wise, my son firmly placed in CTC. However, three weeks into the program it was painfully evident that he wasn't ready for this guide. He didn't have much experience with oral narrations, written narrations, notebooking, and generally wasn't ready for the independence required to fully benefit from this guide. I was frustrated because this was not the start I had so hoped for. I then emailed Carrie and explained how things were going. She said that sometimes kids that aren't ready for a guide, will benefit so much from going to the guide preceding that one. For my son, the best option was to do Preparing with extensions.

Since then, he has grown so much in the skills required to succeed in CTC. Because I have that guide, and we tried it out for three weeks, I know what skills he'd need to master by the time he was in it next year. At first it was hard to accept him being in an earlier guide than I thought he should have, but I prayed a lot about it and God showed us through this that this really was the best option for my son. I have just been thrilled to see him really grow in these skills, and now I know he'll be ready for CTC next year. HOD has a very unique way of using resources to make their programs completely different than any other. Before finding HOD, we were going to use another companies Ancients program. On the surface, there were a lot of similarities to HOD's CTC. After viewing CTC, it was very clear to me that these two programs were completely different! The richness and depth with HOD made me wish that I was the one that was going to use it!!!

All of that to say that maybe doing a program like Preparing Hearts would be a great year for your children to gain the necessary skills to really hit the ground running with either CTC or RTR, however you may choose. Preparing has been such a great year for us, and even with the extensions, my son is learning so much. He's really developing a deeper understanding of history and building pegs on which he'll hang the information learned in CTC, RTR and up. I don't mean to push that what we did is what you should do. I only thought by sharing what our year was like, that maybe there would be something here that may help. You are the expert on what's right for your children, and will be the one to know what's best.


Blessings as you decide!

[Motherjoy]

Having said all that I did before, I should also say this - we LOVED Preparing. Its such a great guide(all the guides are...). I don't think you will regret using it, especially if you don't feel like doing any modifications to RTR. The core of what I was trying to say is that HOD is so good and so flexible. I never thought I'd use it the way we ended up using it this year. But it has worked for us. Any way that you decide to use HOD will be blessing to you.

[striving2Bprov31]

I have not read through this thread thoroughly, so sorry if what I have to say is a repeat, etc.

Let me tell you this.....the way HOD's CtC covers this time period is completely different from Mystery of History. If your children place in CtC, then I would go for it. Again, HOD is totally different in covering the ancients, and I can say that from experience.

To me, CtC covers this time period very in depth, as one long continual story. CtC doesn't just bump from one major person or event to the next, if that makes sense.....in my opinion.

I hope I am not speaking out of turn, this is just my experience.

Hope this helps!

[Carrie]

Robin,

The ladies are doing a terrific job of talking through your options with you! I agree that placement in HOD is definitely based most on developmental skill level, rather than on the history cycle. I will also share with you that the jump from Bigger Hearts to CTC is a big one, with training in many of the needed skills for CTC found in Preparing Hearts. This is not to say that a student must use Preparing Hearts before heading into CTC, just to say that it does really help!

So I'm wanting to be really sure that your 4th and 5th graders place solidly in CTC. They have to be ready to read and follow many written directions on their own, work quite independently, handle the reading material within CTC (which is not easy), and have the skills in place written narration, oral narration, copywork, and grammar. There are many important skills within Preparing Hearts that will make a difference in how well your children do in CTC, so without pondering the history cycle at all, I'd be leaning toward Preparing Hearts as a strong placement option for your kiddos.

If you get a chance to share a little bit more about how your kiddos do in the areas of lengthy copywork, working independently, reading and comprehending higher level material, writing written narrations, giving oral narrations, following lengthy written directions, and grasp of grammar, then we can advise you even better. The reason I mention it, is that these skills make a big difference in placement in Preparing Hearts or CTC.

Blessings,
Carrie