Tapestry of Grace

[SFM]

I have been considering TOG for some time, I tried Sonlight and while I really enjoyed the idea of Sonlight I felt it a tad overkill and not easy to combine with my younger two children and my oldest. My oldest is 8 (3rd) and my youngest two are 4 and 2. I was interested in just doing some research right now because I want to be more prepared to make decisions next year when my son will be in 4th and my daughter a Kindergartener.

 

Thoughts? Is TOG easier to combine with children in those age ranges? Just starting to research and thought I would see if there are parents using it now. Pros and cons?

 

:bigear:

 

Thanks.

[melmichigan]

With your oldest in 3rd it could go one of two ways if your goal is TOG. You could start with SOTW and the literature picks and move to TOG when your youngers are a little older and your oldest moves to Dialetic, or just move to TOG to begin your own education and start accumulating books that your youngers would eventually use. SOTW is one of the alternative spines to TOG's primary reading assignments for UG, which is where your oldest would be. I moved from SL to TOG so that I could combine all my DC into the same time period. It has been an education, and we aren't even to Rhetoric level yet. :)

[TXMary2]

TOG is designed to combine, so yes, you can combine any ages. They would all be on the same theme/time period, but have their own age appropriate reading. With the exception of the read-aloud, which is the same for everyone.

[SFM]

Thank you, that's perfect to know. In fact, we are using SOTW Vol. 3 right now for our "spine". I will keep it in mind as they progress.

 

Thanks.

[WeeBeaks]

Yes, much easier to combine. My kids are now 5th grade, 2nd grade, K and a toddler. I did Sonlight until my oldest was 3rd grade.

 

If you think Sonlight is overkill though, you might want to rethink TOG. I feel it is a lot more than SL ever was, and a whole lot more factual and dry, but it is made manageable for me by the combining factor.

[momee]

I'm sorry to sound snarky but if you think SL is overkill...TOG will blow your mind.

 

The book ordering alone will take you a while. Wonderful, rigorous, deep stuff.

 

We're enjoying the ease of SL for me personally. Order, open, read, discuss, write, discuss, open again.

[Annie Laurie]

I'm sorry to sound snarky but if you think SL is overkill...TOG will blow your mind.

 

The book ordering alone will take you a while. Wonderful, rigorous, deep stuff.

 

We're enjoying the ease of SL for me personally. Order, open, read, discuss, write, discuss, open again.

 

:iagree:

 

SL is pretty simple- lots of books all laid out for you. TOG has so many other aspects to it- visual aids, projects, quizzes, lapbooks, much deeper discussion helps, and on and on. And there are so many choices.

 

I do think TOG is easier to combine so far, but I've only been using it for a week (after getting set up and familiarizing myself with it for weeks), so take what I say with a grain of salt. I really could have combined my kids in SL core 6, even though SL says my 3rd grader is too young, by having him listen in to the SOTW, giving him different readers, and maybe having him skip some of the mature read alouds and adding in a few others for him. It all depends on how you want to do things.

[Random]

I have been considering TOG for some time, I tried Sonlight and while I really enjoyed the idea of Sonlight I felt it a tad overkill and not easy to combine with my younger two children and my oldest. My oldest is 8 (3rd) and my youngest two are 4 and 2. I was interested in just doing some research right now because I want to be more prepared to make decisions next year when my son will be in 4th and my daughter a Kindergartener.

 

Thoughts? Is TOG easier to combine with children in those age ranges? Just starting to research and thought I would see if there are parents using it now. Pros and cons?

 

:bigear:

 

Thanks.

 

I think TOG is the best for combining! You get a weekly lesson plan, with detailed lessons for K-12, revolving around the same time period. There is a significant learning curve, though, as you may have already heard.

 

Have you checked out the three-week sample?

[besroma]

I think TOG is the best for combining! You get a weekly lesson plan, with detailed lessons for K-12, revolving around the same time period. There is a significant learning curve, though, as you may have already heard.

 

Have you checked out the three-week sample?

 

:iagree:

 

There are a lot of books involved, but with the ages of your kids, you will be able to use them over again. We love TOG. The way the schedule is set up is perfect for me.

 

Just try to remember that it is like a buffet....don't try to do it all.....choose what you think fits the education of your family the best.

[melmichigan]

I'm sorry to sound snarky but if you think SL is overkill...TOG will blow your mind.

 

The book ordering alone will take you a while. Wonderful, rigorous, deep stuff.

 

We're enjoying the ease of SL for me personally. Order, open, read, discuss, write, discuss, open again.

 

I think it depends on what the OP means by overkill, to many books, to much jumping around from one book to another, to much historical fiction to teach facts, to much planning (although I have a hard time with that one)? It could be taken a lot of different ways. :) SL is supposed to be open and go, TOG is supposed to be "a buffet" of choices, you pick what works for your family and each child. TOG can be as simple or as drawn out as you choose to make it. Some weeks we keep it simple, some weeks we don't. ;)

[ktgrok]

Biblioplan is another option, and much "less" than TOG.

[Hedgehogs4]

I think TOG is the best for combining! You get a weekly lesson plan, with detailed lessons for K-12, revolving around the same time period. There is a significant learning curve, though, as you may have already heard.

 

This is exactly what I was going to say. There is a learning curve, but at the age of your kids, you can really ease into it.

[AngelBee]

This is exactly what I was going to say. There is a learning curve, but at the age of your kids, you can really ease into it.

 

:iagree: This is the PERFECT time to start TOG. Extremely easy to combine.

 

That said, DO NOT TRY TO DO IT ALL! :D :lol: Did you get that? ;) Ask me how I know....... :p

 

It will be way too much if you do it all. Pick and choose.

[Hedgehogs4]

:iagree: This is the PERFECT time to start TOG. Extremely easy to combine.

 

That said, DO NOT TRY TO DO IT ALL! :D :lol: Did you get that? ;) Ask me how I know....... :p

 

It will be way too much if you do it all. Pick and choose.

 

:iagree:it all looks so good--but really you don't need to do it all. Things are there to be options. I got so burnt out at the end of last year. This year we are taking things much slower and not doing co-op in the same way.

[Kathryn]

I think my recommending it depends on what you mean with saying Sonlight is overkill. We left Sonlight for TOG. We love it and we do a lot, though not everything. It's very easy to combine and offers a wide variety of resources and activities. I was so worried about the "TOG fog" I've read so much about, but we've had no trouble at all. It's like it was made just for me! We read almost all the books for upper and lower grammar (DS reads about 90% of them on his own), do the mapping, some worksheets and discussions. We pick one craft/activity per week. I don't use their writing and don't do anything formal with the vocabulary. We are having a lot of fun with TOG.

[shanvan]

With your oldest in 3rd it could go one of two ways if your goal is TOG. You could start with SOTW and the literature picks and move to TOG when your youngers are a little older and your oldest moves to Dialetic, or just move to TOG to begin your own education and start accumulating books that your youngers would eventually use. SOTW is one of the alternative spines to TOG's primary reading assignments for UG, which is where your oldest would be. I moved from SL to TOG so that I could combine all my DC into the same time period. It has been an education, and we aren't even to Rhetoric level yet. :)

 

I like using SOTW in the younger years. Dd is 10 this year and we will still use it as a spine. Even Ds (14) will end up listening if I read it aloud.

 

I also started TOG so that I could combine, and I do think it is the best curriculum for combining history. I'm not always thrilled with the literature picks for the younger years and often replace or add books.

 

I think the biggest con is that all the extras can feel burdensome to those who have difficulty ignoring them or picking and choosing. There is just no way you can do everything in TOG. If leaving some really great suggestions undone isn't a problem for you then you should be fine in that respect.

 

Other cons I see mentioned are ...

 

--books not available at libraries (often you can substitute)

--cost of books (can be minimized by using a spine)

--some do not like the book choices

--some feel that the history is somewhat disjointed

--can be time consuming for the parent to plan (I see this as almost a necessity, since that is why it is so easily adapted to different ages & stages. Without all the book choices, you would not have the flexibility TOG gives.)

--complaints that Dc cannot find the answers to every question in student pages. (We have had very few problems with this. The couple times it happened I just supplied the info from teacher's notes, no big deal. But, Ds is an excellent reader and remembers details well.)

--year plan itself is expensive and there are extras like maps and evaluations to pay for

 

As for the Pros....

 

--easy to customize for Dc--you can jump up or down a level and mix levels to add more or less challenging material depending on Dc's needs

--enough structure that the parent does not have to reinvent the wheel and plan everything from scratch

--everyone studies the same topics and can discuss them

--Dc gradually learn to schedule their own work instead of looking to parent to schedule everything

--in the upper grades when you may not be able to read every single book alongside Dc you have wonderful teacher's notes to help you.

--has good resale value

 

I'm sure I've neglected to name a few pros & cons, but hope this helps.

 

Both Ds & Dd love TOG and want to continue b/c they feel they are getting more history and more interesting history than they would be from any other program. Sonlight has never been a consideration for me for reasons I will not go into here. Previously I made my own history units. TOG has made it less time consuming, but it is still work to put together all our books and choose which aspects of TOG we will use each year.

 

Not sure if this has been mentioned yet.....buy one unit and try it to see if it works for you. Hope you find what works best whether it is TOG, or something else!

[SFM]

I suppose it wasn't Sonlight that was overkill it was everything that I was adding to Sonlight. I think I discovered that I enjoy piecing things together that work best for our family. Right now we use SOTW with Biblioplan and some Sonlight readers. I suppose it you used Sonlight precisely how it is written out then it would be perfect, I love the idea of Sonlight and often think I might go back one day. I just enjoyed piecing things together more than I thought I would (this is our first year homeschooling).

 

Thank you all for your advise. I love choosing books, I prefer buying books over "curriculum". So, I will give it another year and reevaluate.

[Professormom]

Yes, much easier to combine. My kids are now 5th grade, 2nd grade, K and a toddler. I did Sonlight until my oldest was 3rd grade.

 

If you think Sonlight is overkill though, you might want to rethink TOG. I feel it is a lot more than SL ever was, and a whole lot more factual and dry, but it is made manageable for me by the combining factor.

:iagree:

We used Sonlight for the past 6 years and I wouldn't give that up for anything. We are using TOG this year because I have a logic-stager now, but I wouldn't go back and use TOG for the younger agers. The PP is right, if you think Sonlight is overkill, TOG would be worse:tongue_smilie:

 

Since you have been using SL, you may want to stick with that until you are done with Core E, just fold in your youngers when possible. With the ages of have, you are basically teaching a third-grader. The others are happy with learning to read and doing basic numbers, anything beyond that is just extra anyway. Then, when your old is in 5th, you would be ready to cycle into TOG Year 1 and your middle would be in 1st, this would give you one LG student and one D student in Tapestry and you can use many of your Sonlight books from Core B to bring a little life to TOGs LG book list:001_smile:

 

Hope that helps!