An Overview of Our Programs
Each Heart of Dakota program was designed from the ground up to be educational, Christ-centered, easy-to-use, time-conscious and flexible. Using tried-and-true teaching practices and timeless learning methods, our guides combine living books and hands-on activities to offer a one-of-a-kind homeschool experience. When you use one of our programs, here is what you can expect to find:
Open-and-Go Daily Plans
Our programs are meant to save you time planning, so you can spend your time teaching and learning along with your children. Each program features a plan book (Teacher’s Guide) with daily plans already written for you. These plans are designed for you to simply open up and teach. Subjects are rotated daily, so you are able to cover many areas that are often neglected, without lengthening your school day.
A Biblical Foundation
Our programs strive to keep God’s Word at the heart of everything your children are learning. Whether it is character training, Bible study, or building a Christian worldview, we seek to make God’s Word a priority in your child’s life. The solid, Bible-based content woven within our plans makes biblical truths come alive in meaningful and insightful ways.
Time-Conscious School Days
Our programs are meant to be very time-conscious. They do not require much time to plan, prepare, or present. This allows you to cover all of the necessary skills while still maintaining a shorter school day. It also gives you the needed time for children to explore their own interests and hobbies.
Quality Living Books
Rather than supplying you with a daunting list of required reading for your students to consume, each program utilizes carefully chosen living books to make each day’s learning memorable. All daily readings in our programs are purposefully planned, so students can savor and dwell on engaging books a little at a time throughout the year. In this way, your children get to “live” with a book for a lengthier period of time, and it becomes a part of them. Living with a book also helps children make insightful connections as they sift, sort, and share what they read.
A Choice of Resources
Even though we often get more done with a planned approach to learning, we also love having choices. So, at Heart of Dakota you’ll notice a choice of resources in many areas to allow you to customize our programs to meet your family’s individual needs.
Lessons That Fit a Variety of Learning Styles
All of our programs are written with the auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learner in mind, ensuring that their preferred learning style will be addressed each day. No matter what type of learner you have, our well-balanced approach to school will spark new interests and foster a love for learning!
A Skill Progression Leading to Independence
You’ll also notice that each guide emphasizes skills that prepare a child well for the next guide in line. This means that as your children mature, we incrementally train them in the skills needed to match their growing independence. As expectations build, skills and assignments your child has been trained to do are gradually handed over to be done independently. Our upper guides designate skills as being “teacher-directed,” “semi-independent,” and “independent.” This pattern builds confident, self-sufficient learners who can learn for a lifetime!