HOD vs Home-Made CM Plan and discussion of levels

[CathyCDK]

Hi,

I am so attracted to HOD for my oldest daughters, ages 12 and 10 years. We used Sonlight up to Core 3 (D) and then got stuck in a unit of Tapestry of Grace. Most of our LA has been work booky. We adopted 3 younger children last May, and I started homeschooling them with HOD LHTH and LHFHG. They are currently 7, 6, and 4 1/2. We all LOVE HOD, even my older ones want to join in!

 

I've been trying to come up with a plan to create a HOD-CM like plan for my oldest two using what I already have from SL, TOG and other things. One reason I resist just taking the plunge and totally switching to HOD is that I am so used to combining them. The only subject they aren't together is Math, and even with that they are only 6 months apart. I've read over and over how HOD recommends keeping each in their own guide at their own level. I almost want to get the youngest guide recommended for their age, and start at the beginning to ensure they have all the necessary skills that build over the years. . (We've never done narration, copywork or dictation.) I'm also a bit afraid that I can't handle 5 separate guides at the same time. (I also wonder how to reconcile years that are 4 day plans with years that are 5 day plans, or those that are different weeks in length.)

 

My home-made plan takes the framework of HOD, using materials that I already have, which helps the budget. I tend to want to overschedule and have a poor sense of what can actually be accomplished in a day. I like that we can keep studying history chronologically. I can keep my kids together in most subjects and add in my younger ones at their level (similar to TOG.) But it's so much work to do all this research and planning. And I wonder what I might be neglecting, like higher level thinking skills.

 

So, let the debate begin: Which side of the fence should I jump to? Should I take the plunge and completely switch totally to HOD for all my kids? Or should I continue my quest to create the plan that is perfect for our family using CM and HOD as roadmaps, and using materials we already have?

 

Blessings,

Cathy

[Edwena]

Personally I'd go with HOD, but would never attempt 5 manuals. At the most, maybe 3. Seems to me you could combine the oldest two, then the next 2, and then the littlest in its own manual. I love HOD though. I feel it is very balanced and love the progression of skills it builds. Plus no planning. Aahhh, how that's brought joy back to my homeschooling. I have much more time to join my family in other activities other than planning and prepping for the week.

 

I guess the main thing is to find what's most important to you.

[lotsofpumpkins]

I guess it just depends on what you have more of: time or money! We are using HOD this year but won't continue, because it just gets more and more expensive. I have learned a lot through having dc in Preparing this year, about narrations, timelines, vocab work, etc, so I'm comfortable adding those assignments to whatever books we read next year.

 

If you do choose to use HOD, remember that the programs from Bigger on up have extensions. So, your oldest two should be combinable. The 3 youngers might not all be combinable yet, but in the future they might be. I think you could do HOD with 2 or 3 guides. Have you asked about this on the HOD boards? The ladies there can give you placement help if you need it.

[CathyCDK]

Right now, lol, I don't have much time or much money! But I do have a lot of curriculum! And I have books about books, like History Through the Ages and Honey for a Child's Heart. I have complete Sonlight Cores PreK 3/4 through Core 4 (E). Plus I have hundreds if not thousands of books in our home library. Our library system is average.

 

Is there a way to become comfortable with Copywork passages, narration, and dictation without following an HOD guide for a year?

 

Thanks,

Cathy

[lotsofpumpkins]

I think if you read up on Charlotte Mason you can learn more about using narration, dictation, etc. I know there's simplycharlottemason.com, and there's others that I don't remember the names of right now.

 

Basically, my 3rd and 4th graders have one written narration per week, on the history for that day. They have oral narration daily, sometimes history, sometimes science. Once a week they make timeline cards with important people, events, etc; whatever we've covered in history that week. Once a week they take 3-5 words from that day's history reading and look them up in the dictionary and write the definitions and a sentence in their vocab notebooks. 3-4 days per week they do studied dictation, but we are going back to R&S Spelling next year.

 

My 1st grader does copywork each day, and in theory he should be narrating after we read history/science. He doesn't always retain much of what I read to him, but at this age I don't worry about it. We are working hard on the 3R's this year!

 

Besides reading CM sites, you can also look at samples at the HOD site; even if you end up not using HOD, you can figure out what they are supposed to be doing at each level based on samples. There's only 1 week of samples, but every week follows pretty much the same pattern. I'm sure you noticed that from using HOD this year.

 

I think if I were you I'd try to use the books I already own. It sounds like you have a LOT! If you are short on time, you could even try it Robinson-style for a while-- math and lots of reading; the youngers do copywork and the olders write papers about what they've read. I know that's not as fun as HOD, but if you are in a busy season it'll work. You can just give each dc a list of all the books that you own that are near their reading level, and let them read! If I had a huge home library I'd be inclined to do something like that, because I feel badly that there are books on our shelf that no one has read yet (and our home library isn't all that big!)

 

Oh, and if you want to do dictation, there's free dictation books available for download at Google books. I know there's been threads about that before; if you do a search you ought to be able to find them.

[raceNzanesmom]

I switched to HOD because I was soooooo tired of all the planning, and we LOVE it. BUT, I'm only schooling one. That makes a big difference on time and $$.

 

Have you looked at SCM for ideas?

http://simplycharlottemason.com/timesavers/narration/

http://simplycharlottemason.com/store/samples/Spelling-Wisdom-Sample.pdf

http://simplycharlottemason.com/timesavers/manucopywork/

 

Start with oral narration before moving to written. hth.

[CathyCDK]

Thank you for your replies! I will be digging into the CM sites for the rest of the day, lol!

 

Another question: How does one determine what books are worthy for reading? I know to look at book lists in catalogs, like Sonlight and Heart of Dakota. But what about when you're browsing the library and you see books on topics? Sometimes there are series, such as a book for each colony, or different systems of the human body. How does one chose the best from the good?

 

Thanks,

Cathy

[lotsofpumpkins]

Well, our library is tiny so we aren't relying on it much for school books. I buy a lot of books from half.com, and I rely on recommendations I see here, as well as the HOD booklist. I also read reviews on amazon and see what other people purchased who bought that book.

 

When it comes to library books, you're just going to have to pre-read if you aren't sure. You probably don't have to read the whole thing to get a pretty good idea of whether you can use it or not.

[kristinannie]

Or should I continue my quest to create the plan that is perfect for our family using CM and HOD as roadmaps, and using materials we already have?

 

 

 

This is what I would do. It is actually what I plan to do. I think combining is the best. You can have some family read alouds and then assign reading to each child on their level. There are so many great book lists out there that it should be easy to find what you need. The hard part for me is paring it down!!! Best of luck!