New to HOD, and have some questions.

[RestInHim]

Hey, everyone! I am happy to be here. My name is Sara, and my wonderful husband and I have three great kids ages 5, 3.5, and 10 months. We are a conservative Christian family with a vision to raise our children in the Lord, and part of that for us, as for many of you, is homeschooling. We have not yet begun using Heart of Dakota, but I am planning on using it this coming school year. So let me get into our position and some of the questions that I have about the curriculum. Sorry, this will be long!

Let me begin with our oldest, our daughter Cassidy. She is a very advanced, highly intelligent, hilariously funny, heart-warmingly sweet, extremely strong-willed beauty with a big dose of ADHD. She basically catches on to concepts before I can finish teaching them. My challenge with her is simply keeping up with her. I reluctantly started K with her when she was a month shy of 4 years old, because academically she was ready. I say reluctantly, because I felt unready to move so quickly. She, however, has thrived on working through K and now, this year, 1st grade. She's doing amazing. She loves it and is retaining well.

Next is our sweet and completely adorable son Joel Peter, who is 3 and a half. As he has matured I have assumed (wrongly) that he would follow a much more traditional schedule. I began just a couple of months ago working some preschool with him. And I realized that he is already far ahead of where he 'should' be. He can almost read already, and I've put almost no time in with him. He works with numbers with confidence and accuracy. He's working through a K math book right now with no difficulty. I'm trying to 'teach' him letters and discovered he not only knows 3/4 of them, he knows their sounds as well. I guess sitting on my lap as I teach Cassidy hasn't been for nothing.

If you've made it this far, bless you! Now for the questions.
Cassidy: I have realized that, although she still enjoys it, our schooling has become simply a stuffing of facts into her poor head, and I really want to bring it back into proper focus, which is relationship! I feel that HOD will help us do that. However, having looked at the placement chart, there is some discrepancy in where to place her. Originally, I planned to put her in Beyond Little Hearts, and sort of slow down and redo first grade. However, she is going to be ready academically to start English 2 and Math 2. Can I use the history and literature portion of Beyond with 2nd grade English and Math?

Joel: Age-wise, Joel would be in Little Hands to Heaven. But he'll really be ready to start reading and math by this coming fall. Would it be wise for him to start working slowly through Little Hearts for His Glory instead? I think he would be bored with Little Hands at this point.

Input? Thanks!

[RestInHim]

Sorry to reply to my own post, but I did want to add that I've been reading through some of your more recent topics and you are an inspiration to me! I am just now trying to really fine tune what works for us, and your experience and helpful insights have already helped me! Thanks!

[Gwenny]

Welcome to HOD! I think you will love it. My family is so grateful for it.

I would encourage you to slow down a little bit. It sounds like the children are really soaking it all in and learning so much, that is fantastic. There is a difference though between knowing how to read and work with numbers and their little hearts and minds being ready for more "mature" things. You don't want to miss the wonderful "easy" stories for youngers, or fingerplays and creative play for the little guy, or for your daughter either. I agree that the learning numbers and letters in LHTH would be unnecessary for him if he already knows those things. If you don't want to do that, I would say don't do a program for him yet. Just read lots of books, do fingerplays, crafts, songs, play, play, puzzles and you can do lots of math games, etc. They will be doing "school" for a lot of years, don't rush it. I LOVE LHFHG, but he will get so much more out of it when he is older, even though right now he might be able to "understand" it. That's true for all ages, even old ones like me. I learned and "understood" some things a long time ago, but I sure understand some things a lot better now.

Your daughter can definitely do the higher math and english with Beyond. But, at her age, you would not want to go beyond the history readings and stories that are in there.

I remember being where you are, as far as my oldest being very young. I remember thinking that she was "so old". Now that she is 25, I realize how little she was. I still have young ones, it's amazing how much "younger" my 10, 8, 5, and 14 months old children seem compared to my first ones.

Emails can't show emotion, so I hope you take this as it is intended. I am smiling and encouraging you to enjoy these young years with just a few children to love and cherish right now. Don't make them grow up too soon. I'm an older woman hoping to encourage the younger moms like God wants me to do.

Blessings to you!
Nancy

[RestInHim]

Your daughter can definitely do the higher math and english with Beyond. But, at her age, you would not want to go beyond the history readings and stories that are in there.

Thanks for your reply! My hesitation at moving forward is exactly the same as yours: I didn't want to miss all the great things I see in Beyond! Also, I really do want to slow down and really enjoy the process with her, and get everything out of it we can. So we agree.
Cassidy, however, simply wants to fly through everything at super speed, so it's challenging getting her to slow down with anything. I'm glad you think we could do Math and English 2 with Beyond, because she wouldn't get much out of re-doing 1st grade math. Looking forward to seeing more insight! Thanks for taking the time to share your experience with me, Nancy!

[RestInHim]

Oh, and I also wanted to add that, in the spirit of relaxing and slowing her down, I am planning on doing the R&S English 2 at half-speed or even slower...she just doesn't need to cram all that in so fast. And even though it's easy for her now, I assume that at some point the more abstract concepts of math will become difficult for her, and at that point we will slow way down with that at well. Right now she is working through cementing her addition and subtraction facts through ten, and can do it in her head.