Ok this information helps me a ton. AAS doesn't have a set age to begin using it but if your child is sounding out CVC words (even slowly and painfully) he can begin AAS. I need to know a few more things before I can truly advise you on AAR. How old is your son and what phonics and language arts are you using with him now? If I know those I can probably help you better. I also highly recommend spending some time reading at The Chatterbee if you haven't already. It's a great place to ask questions about AAS and AAR and there are many women with children that have all kinds of LD's there. It's a great place.

Karen, I understand the confusion. When you asked about the writing I wondered if you were talking about PAL:Writing :001_smile: I've looked very closely at PAL and own AAR Pre-1 and AAS. PAL looks great to me but when I look at the samples it looks like it takes a great deal of time each day to do all of PAL Reading and Writing. I'm also looking at PAL through a very impressed AAS lens. I LOVE AAS and believe in the method more than any other method I've used (I'm embarrassed to say how many phonics/spelling/LA curriculums I've used). So while PAL looks great it boils down to this for me. I trust Marie Ripple. AAR Pre-1 was expensive and it was hard to spend that money. I'm so glad I did. Yet again Marie has produced a very strong product and again I believe in what she's doing and why she's doing it the way she does. I do plan to spend some good time at the IEW booth at my convention looking at PAL in its entirety because I do like the looks of it. My tentative plans are to use AAR Level 1 when I finish AAR Pre-1 and use AAR for teaching my just turned 5 year old to read. I will begin AAS with him when he's ready (anticipating later in the "school" year or for 1st grade. I'm looking into PAL: Writing for him also. Since PAL Writing uses AAS too I might just start PAL Writing when he's ready and move right into AAS as scheduled or recommended within PAL: Writing. So we would start PAL Writing late in the next year or for 1st grade. I won't know until I get to that place with him. All of this is tentative until I can see AAR Level 1 when it comes out and PAL at convention. Is everything clear as mud now? :lol: I should also mention that our core curriculum exposes my children to many of the things included in PAL Reading such as the poetry. So I know that my child will still get the exposure to the things we won't get if we don't do PAL Reading.

:bigear:

There are different versions of Morning Bells. You just have a different version than the one HOD sells. I had a different version and I emailed HOD and they emailed me the TOC from their version so I could see what the title of the reading was that was referenced in my manual. It was very easy to find it in my version after that. Email them and I bet they'll send it to you too. I looked to see if I still had it but I don't or I'd give it to you myself. Hope that helps!

Jennifer did a good job explaining what Pre-1 teaches. Level 1 will be out this summer. AAR and AAS will work together. AAR will teach the child to read along with other skills (as evidenced by Pre-1) and will move into a reading curriculum that can be used into middle school. When the child is ready to start spelling you would start AAS. Both AAR and AAS can be used together but most likely you won't be using AAS while you are using the first few levels of AAR. Hope that helps!

Karen, We love it! I thought it was expensive too but honestly I don't regret spending the money. My son loves it and the skills it's teaching are sticking with my son. Level 1 is scheduled to be out this summer. We are really looking forward to using Level 1 after Pre-1. The way AAR will work with AAS: The early levels of AAR will teach the child to read and then move into a reading curriculum that can be used throughout middle school. When the child is ready to start spelling you can begin AAS alongside AAR. Marie Ripple is on The Chatterbee and will answer questions about AAR and AAS. It's a great place to talk to other users and ask questions. When you say writing program I'm not sure what you mean. AAR doesn't really have a writing portion. There are activities you can choose and learning to write the letters is one of them but there is not a specific handwriting portion. Feel free to ask more questions. I'll be happy to try to answer them. Hope that helps!

I'm using AAS with my older son and AAR with my younger one. AAR takes about 30 minutes (not counting reading aloud for the recommended 20 minutes) and AAS takes me 20 minutes. I don't count the reading aloud time that AAR says to do because we already read aloud that much or more each day. I'm not sure if that's what you are looking for but hope it helps! :)

Great article. Thanks for sharing.

:bigear: I really want IEW but the cost is expensive. From what I've seen I do think it's worth the money though. :001_smile:

Thanks everyone. I'm honestly still undecided but I've got our local convention in May and I hope I'll be able to decide after that. I'm going to spend some time looking at things there. Thanks again!

Just bumping this up so more people might vote and comment.

I'm trying to decide what to do with my youngest son regarding handwriting. In many ways I wish I had done cursive first with my older son and had planned to start with cursive for the just turned 5 year old. I'm just not sure now. What did you start with first? Print or cursive? What is/was your experience and what do you wish you had done differently in hind sight? What curriculum did you use? Do you wish you had used a different curriculum and if so why? Thanks everyone!

Korin, I haven't read the responses yet so if this isn't applicable please forgive me. My first thought as I read your post was that if this was me I would go to Heart of Dakota's web site and start buying book packs and just read the books. I would start with Preparing Hearts read alouds as my read to them books. Then I would look at Drawn Into the Heart of Readings book packs for the appropriate book level and buy those for them to read. Preparing's read aloud books Scroll down to History read alouds. Drawn Into's Book Packs HOD's manuals also have extension book packs for older children that they could read. Each HOD manual has a read aloud book pack and extension pack books. Some manuals have history read alouds options along with boy and girl read aloud options too. Check out Creation to Christ to see what I mean. We use HOD so I don't spend much time thinking about these things but if I didn't use HOD as our core :001_smile: I'd sure be using the thought out for me book packs they have :D I hope that helps some!

We'll be doing Ancients next year with my then 6th grader using Heart of Dakota's Creation to Christ with the extension package. We have been drooling over this guide for a while. We can't wait to start.

tarana, you probably don't want the book with the piano on the front. That is for school systems. There is a homeschool edition that comes in a kit. Here is a link to the kit at Rainbow Resource http://www.rainbowresource.com/product/Math+5-4+Homeschool+KIT+%283rd+Edition+%29/024422/1301040933-345647 If you are homeschooling that's what I would recommend and the kit comes with the tests etc. Hope that helps!

We use Saxon because of the continual review of the materials. My son needs the constant review. We love Saxon here.

Pudewa, Gibbs, & Ham for sure. Oh and Art Reed. He's great.

Jennifer, I do understand the hesitation if you feel it might not challenge your dd. One thing I can concretely tell you about HOD is that it's often considered light when in reality it's not. It's very meaty at each level. I honestly just speak from experience here. HOD is oft overlooked because of the simplicity of the manual. Carrie has truly streamlined your whole day but it's right on par with general ability within the age range that the manual is geared to. There are also extension packages for each guide starting at Bigger Hearts on up. So you could take the manual that she fits in and use the extensions for her and I think you would find that she would be challenged more than you might think on initial examination. Also within each manual are schedules for different levels so that you can place your dd where she should be within dictation, math, and with these latest manuals science and more. They are truly written with the busy homeschool mom in mind while not sacrificing the academics. The placement chart here is critical imho. If you find where she places there and then consider extensions I think you might be pleasantly surprised at the depth that is in those manuals. Then again you might not ;) but I always recommend that people sit and simmer with HOD before making a concrete decision on it. It can be deceptive at first glance.

:leaving:

Yes HOD does recommend R&S which is not CM but the way that it is recommended to use R&S is CM style. I never got more than a few weeks into HOD a couple of years back. My son is 5th grade and I'm using HOD now. The younger son is only 4 about to turn 5 in a month. HOD does oral and written narration with history and science, copywork is done in history, science and poetry. Poetry and dictation are also written into the HOD guides. The Poems are in the guides and you do not have to use another book. Memorization is also written into the guides. You memorize scripture and poetry. HOD parts ways on a few points of CM but not many at all. The points that are different I personally agree with the reasoning behind why HOD wrote them that way. :001_smile:

Ok I just scrolled up and read a bit. I see talk of writing, narrations, etc. This is one thing I LOVE about HOD. It's all scheduled out for me in CM style increments and it's basically 1 (maybe 2) writing assignments a day. He retains his history and science through notebooking and other activities. I've done so many things with my older son :huh: I much prefer this over anything else we've done. The methods work. I don't mean to sound like a walking talking billboard for HOD but the biggest regret I have is not starting this when I found it a few years ago. I'm confident we'd be much further along spiritually and academically if we had. ;)

I haven't read all the reply's so if this is a repeat forgive me. If you are wanting to stream line LA then I would get on the IEW yahoo group and read, read, read. There are long discussions right now on grammar and of course writing. LA talk in general. I've been thinking about what I want to do with my son so I've been very interested in the talk there. R&S is fine but I'm wondering if there is a better way to approach grammar and LA than is common with most homeschoolers. Don't know if that would help you but it sure has given me some things to ponder regarding LA in general. P.S. We started out with BJU dvd's too. I commend you for finishing them. I couldn't. The curriculum and the teaching are top notch but our days are SO SO LONG. Life was not happening at all. We've switched to HOD and couldn't be happier now.

This book and the phonograms are scheduled in the out of print Learning at Home Preschool and Kindergarten by Ann Ward. I've always thought it looked solid but have never owned it. Ward recommends using the Wanda Saneri cards since they are the same 70 phonograms as the Dettmer book. Maybe at that time Dettmer didn't include flash cards to use. Hmmm I'm still looking into a phonics curriculum for almost 5 year old to start on in the fall when he's 5.5. This makes me think about it again. I wonder. Can you still get this book? Off to find out ;)

My recommendation is Heart of Dakota. I will be using this as my core from here on out because of the Christ centered focus it brings to our day. In all the daily academic pursuits we are consistently being lead to Jesus and to examine our relationship and actions toward Him. Heart of Dakota

I will be using Heart of Dakota for the very reasons you have listed as wanting to find in curriculum. HOD has proved to be the most Christ centered curriculum while keeping the academics going also. Here is a post on my blog about a day with HOD and the major spiritual gains we had that particular day. Miraculous Change I'm a curriculum junkie and the biggest regret I have where homeschooling is concerned it that I did not start HOD when I found and stick with it. We would be in a much different spiritual (not to mention academic) place if I had. The single thing I think that makes HOD different is the fact that in so much of our academic pursuits within HOD we are consistently lead to Jesus, to examine our actions and relationship with Jesus. Hope that helps!