what to do for kdg next year??

[rod_squad]

Hi. im sure this ? is somewhere on these boards but I cant find it so Ill ask again. DS5 will be doing kdg next year. (I had initally thought this year would be his kdg but wow, he is just not into school. I thought another year of just being home and working on a few small things each day would be ok.) I bought LHFHG to use for next year. My DD3 is really bright. She is pretty amazing and with really little to no formal instruction, knows all of her letter sounds and names. She goes to a preschool 2 days a week and loves it. I had planned on sending her back next year for 3 days a week and then bringing her home for kdg.
SO..Im really torn as to what to do for next year. I thought if I waited to do LHFHG while DS is in 1st and DD is in kdg, I could teach them together but then what would I do with DS for his kdg year? Am I making any sense???
I can borrow curric from their options school for free. I could do phonics, math, reading and writing with him. Or am I totally holding him back just to make my life easier? With 4 kids, I cannot possibly imagine doing 4 guides!! They are 2 years apart but they look and act like twins.

Thoughts appreciated!!! Hope you all had a very Merry Christmas!!!

[krismoose]

I think that starting phonics, handwriting and math as he's ready for them (maybe stagger-start them?) would be just fine for K. You are not holding him back if you can see that he's not ready for much seatwork yet. That will give you the flexibility to add other activities as your (and his) interests lead. We got one of Janice Vancleave's Play-and-find-out-science books from the library a few different times and did experiments. I got some of those Let's read-and-find-out-science books from the library. I collected paper tubes, tissue boxes, string, etc. in a bin for a short season and would bring that out with scissors and glue every few weeks (when I was feeling especially brave) and let them at it . I say this having started LHFHG at 4.5 with my ds and finished it a bit too soon to be ready for the next guide . My dd will be 5 soon, and this time around, I am in no hurry to start a full K program. We do some phonics and math a few days a week, and read from various Bibles regularly, but I'm not going to start the history part of LHFHG until *maybe* next winter. I think you are wise to consider what will realistically happen in a house full of littles . You are going to be a great teacher because you obviously know your children very well .

[MomtoJGJE]

What if you did LHTH with the right side K options from LHFHG? If you started now and went at his pace then you'd probably finish up before the next year when you want to start with both of them.... Then he'd have done the right side K stuff and could easily move to the 1st options.

And if you didn't really want to push at all you could just do the K level fine motor skills/handwriting... leave the math to do together and that way you'd have the hands on stuff for both of them right there in the guide without having to purchase the Beyond guide.

[Larissa]

I am dealing with the same thing with my youngest two children. I have a son who just turned 5 and a daughter who is almost 3. I am already running 2 guides. (Beyond and Preparing) I have seen how well the guide worked when the children were placed exactly where they should be as opposed to trying to make them fit. However, I keep thinking about how great it would be to have at least 2 of them combined. In order for me to do that, I would need to do what was described earlier and just do the basics for K with my 5 year old next year without a guide and wait until the following year to do the LHFHG guide with 1st grade options and put my youngest who will turn 5 mid-school year into LHFHG with K options. More than likely my youngest will be ready to do K early. I am just not sure that I want her proceeding through the guides at the youngest age for the guides.
So, I will more than likely end up doing what I always do ... spending hours thinking about how I can possibly combine them - just to end up not combining them at all.

What I will probably end up doing is starting my 3rd child in LHFHG next fall with K options. (I am already doing light K work this year with him. We are slowly working our way through TRL, math, and handwriting. We will not, however, finish them.) I will do it only 4 days a week, however, instead of 5. So, it will take us more than one school year to get through it. My oldest son is on a 4 day schedule with Preparing and we LOVE the flexibility that it provides. So, my plan will be to keep everyone on a 4 days schedule. Keep in mind that once your children get into the upper guides, they become much more independent. This provides you with more time to work with the younger ones. Even running the two guide this year (Preparing and Beyond) is not that big of a deal. My oldest has a lot of independent work. Next year in CTC, he will have even more, which will help a great deal since I will be running 3 guides.

[MelInKansas]

Let me get it straight, you are wanting to do LHFHG with your son and daughter in fall of 2013? So you are looking for something to fill in for your son for 2012-2013 school year, his K year? How old will your daughter be in fall 2013? If she will be almost 5 it seems like that would work. The issue I have going forward (as my two who are 2 years apart I would dearly love to combine them but so far haven't been able to make that work and still feel like I am serving their needs where they are at) is that my 2nd DD just isn't ready to move that far ahead, and I feel like I would be holding my oldest back in order to make that work. Plus I just couldn't figure out what to do for that extra year, and I am so glad I went ahead with Beyond because it has been sooo great for my DD this year.

There are a lot of resources you could pull from, even in the guides. There are supplemental read-alouds, things that would help you prep. Maybe there even are in LHTH, I have to confess I have never looked - additional resources and books that you can use to supplement. So maybe you could as others have suggested just continue with some fine-motor, reading, writing, and math and use LHTH or use something else to give you some Bible and/or history and activities to make it fun. I also have to admit I am terrible at planning out stuff like that so it really intimidates me. I hope you figure out what to do.

[Heidi in AK]

Hi rod_squad! I think this has been said here, but I'll throw it in just in case not. I think you could do two things. We had the same issue and The Three R's by Ruth Beechick just convinced me, first, that you're doing the right thing by sensing his readiness and just holding off. Believe me, I'm sure he's learning through being around you and playing!

I mentioned two things you could do. It really depends, and maybe with trial and error you'll find the right mix. You could completely hold off on LHFHG till first grade with first grade options, then for K you could:

1. Just do the 3R's as recommended in LHFHG's RH side. You already have it so you could just go ahead and use it, then purchase the first grade options for next year. With DD, you could let her do as much as she can. If she is in preschool this year, this might hold her off on doing math/phonics/writing? Maybe?

2. Do LHTH with the RH side of LHFHG for DS for his K year. The pluses to this are that he gets Bible in addition to the 3R's, and he gets used to homeschooling.

I would just try LHTH + the RH side of LHFHG and if it is too much, drop LHTH. However, you can try adding it periodically and see if he's ready for the extra 30 mins that LHTH brings. It is such a great program, it'd be great for you to do it if you can, to build up to LHFHG the next year for first grade!

I find with my DD5.5 who's in K that she has to be trained that school is something we always do. She's used to just playing, which was our mindset for 4 entire years. She's had to work through that, and not doing school is not an option. (This is within reason; our goal is to do school 4 days/week.)

HTH! Blessings on your decision!

[my3sons]

What if you did LHTH with the right side K options from LHFHG? If you started now and went at his pace then you'd probably finish up before the next year when you want to start with both of them.... Then he'd have done the right side K stuff and could easily move to the 1st options...

Love this idea. I found LHTH helped my dc learn to have a mini-balanced school day. By having each subject represented but in a smaller ways, it helped my dc move into LHFHG more easily, where each subject is also represented, but in a more in-depth way. LHTH helped my dc learn to listen to history using "The New Bible in Pictures for Little Eyes", and answer comprehension questions about it each day. When they got to LHFHG's history, and had to listen to longer readings and had to show their comprehension of the reading in more ways, they were prepared. LHTH helped my dc learn to do simple art projects and develop fine motor skills. When they got to LHFHG's longer and harder art projects, they were prepared. LHTH helped my dc learn to use their body to show comprehension of simple Fingerplays and Rhymes. When they got to LHFHG's longer Fingerplays and Rhymes that teach large gross motor skills and history skills as well (i.e. the names of the continents), they were prepared. LHTH's "Hide and Seek Letter" pages helped my dc learn left to right directionality, find letters within words, and learn fine motor skills using markers. When they got to LHFHG's harder fine motor skills in R & S's "Do It Carefully" and "Finding the Answers" workbooks, they were prepared. LHTH's devotions were short and had colorful pictures with follow-up comprehension questions. When my dc got to LHFHG's harder devotional "Devotions for the Children's Hour" which has harder concepts and very few pictures, they were prepared. I could go on, but what I am trying to say is LHTH prepared my dc for the work they did in LHFHG. It gave them work in bite-sized amounts in each subject area in a balanced way, and this helped them be ready for the increased skills needed to do LHFHG. I would definitely do LHTH along with the right side of LHFHG with your ds, as this will give him a balanced school day and will give him the skills to do well with LHFHG. It sounds like then it will work for your ds and younger dd to be combined in LHFHG. When dc are only 2 years apart, they are usually close enough in skills to be combined. It sounds like this is the case for your sweeties! HTH!

In Christ,
Julie

[rod_squad]

Thank you all for your thoughtful replies! Sounds like I need to get LHTH and do that NEXT year with both kids. I already have LHFHG and will do the right side with my son. I think I can handle that!

They are so funny. If I let them stay up later than the rest of the kids, they really know that I love them and they think Im the very best mom EVER. Its amazing how much school we can get done during that quiet one on one time. I think for my strong willed DS5 (he is like a celebrity on these boards, so many posts about him. ha!) I will give him a few nights a week where he is the big kid and we do school at night. Then, during the day we can do Legos and other fun activites. I think Ive gotten myself so public school schedule oriented, I am losing that desire to let him learn at his own pace. Thats what led me to homeschool in the first place!

Thank you again!! Blessings. s