ChrisB Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 Is there anyone here on the HS forum that has successfully completed the RS series? My oldest is almost finished with level E, and I am coming up with a game plan that hopefully takes us through the middle school years and into high school. If anyone is interested, here is a recent thread on the Logic Board that talks about RS to Pre-Algebra. There are many of us finishing RS-E soon, and, if they're anything like me, I want to know our best course of action going forward. The company recommends VideoText (through Algebra) to use with RS-G (Geometry), but I'd like to explore other options. If I like the way RS approaches math, what will I like for upper math? What have you used to bridge between RS and Algebra? TIA! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arcara Posted March 17, 2014 Share Posted March 17, 2014 Following Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisB Posted March 18, 2014 Author Share Posted March 18, 2014 No one? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisB Posted March 24, 2014 Author Share Posted March 24, 2014 One last plea... :bigear: Are there no RS graduates? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blossom'sGirl Posted March 25, 2014 Share Posted March 25, 2014 I have 3 boys who completed Rightstart through Lev. E. None of them did the geometry program so I'm not sure if that is what you mean by completing RightStart. My oldest did Singapore 5 and 6 and then Pre-Algebra before Algebra. 2nd ds did CLE 500 and 600 and the AOPS Pre-Algebra and is now doing Foersters Algebra in 8th. My 3rd ds is doing CLE 500 currently and will do 600 next year. I don't see him doing AOPS as he doesn't like to think too far out of the box math-wise. RightStart does a lot of jumping around without much review. It works OK for some kids, but I found that we needed a bit more text work in 5th and 6th grade before moving forward in concepts. I love RightStart for the first 4 grades. It gave them all a great start in mental math. My 2nd ds is like a human calculator which I completely attribute to RS. I think your path after RS really depends on the child. I loved AOPS for the way it teaches Pre-Algebra. To be honest, I found much of it to be more challenging than our current Algebra. Some children could do it earlier than 7th grade; it would have been frustration for us. CLE drove my quick learner nuts, but he needed more practice in working problems for a longer period of time, as the RS worksheets didn't tend to take very long. My 3rd ds needs the repetition that CLE offers and it has helped him to build confidence in his work. I didn't really care for Singapore at all. I think it is the mastery method that I don't like. I do love Singapore's Challenging Word Problem books and had all of my boys work through them concurrently with their regular math. HTH Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thegeyser Posted March 25, 2014 Share Posted March 25, 2014 Thank you for taking the time to reply. I am the OP from the Logic board. I have narrowed my options down to Singapore or CLE, so I found your post to be especially timely and helpful. We've had a little regression with our math inattention/melt-downs, so I would be very reluctant to try to push him into something too difficult right now. Since my guy is so used to the short lessons from RighStart, I know I need to build him up to longer problem sets. I had been considering the CLE 600 series, so I will definitely go back and reevaluate what level would be best for him next. I just started some test prep with him today and was working out of the 5th grade Spectrum book. The only thing that we encountered that we hadn't covered was estimating, since RightStart never covered that skill. I own SM 5A Text and was having him work out some of the problems out of it last week to see how he did. He said he doesn't like it and definitely gave me push back. I do like the thought of CLE with the Challenging Word Problems, so that may help give the challenging edge to the CLE that I am concerned it does not have. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisB Posted March 26, 2014 Author Share Posted March 26, 2014 I have 3 boys who completed Rightstart through Lev. E. None of them did the geometry program so I'm not sure if that is what you mean by completing RightStart. ...It gave them all a great start in mental math. My 2nd ds is like a human calculator which I completely attribute to RS. Thanks for your reply! For me, through level E would complete RS since even Dr. Cotter suggests using level G with another program, IIRC. I agree that RS is giving my children a great start in mental math. That's one of the reasons I chose it to begin with. I'd like to cover some of G because my hope is that it might be a good basic introduction to trigonometry and a few other upper level math concepts, but we'll see. My oldest is a little like your 3rd DS who doesn't like think much outside of the math box. For this reason, I hesitate to do anything like AoPS with her. However, I have her and my second working with Beast Academy on the side and they both love it. My second LOVES math, doesn't get frustrated with it, loves BA, so he might be a candidate for AoPS. I'll have to see if I can borrow a copy of Foersters to review. I'd like something straight forward without too much "clutter" and with the why explained well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirabillis Posted May 9, 2014 Share Posted May 9, 2014 We're by no means graduates, in the sense of high school & beyond... but we're just finishing 6th grade and LOVED RS! My younger 3 are in A, C & D and loving it. We finished RS E 4th grade. I didn't want to move straight to RS G or VT Algebra for 5th grade. I'd read many places that RS needs fraction, decimals, percents review, so we jumped to Singapore. We liked Singapore, didn't love it like RS, but it was similar and got the job done. My son liked it a lot! We took the placement test and started back a bit at SM 4B/5A for 5th grade 6th grade = SM 5B/6A (finished both by mid-year) Decided to jump ship to Pre-Algebra before Algebra I in 7th grade. Started AoPs, but it brought my mathy kid to tears! Jumped to Dolciani Pre-Algebra which he loves. Combining that with RS-G (finally pulled that out), and it's a good fit. Will finish RS-G in 7th grade, and Dolciani Pre-A end of 6th grade (breezing through it, will take us just 1 semester) Now I need to decide an Algebra route to head... and that's why I'm here researching again. Will let you know when I make it on the other side of the Algebra tunnel! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisB Posted May 11, 2014 Author Share Posted May 11, 2014 Thanks for sharing your experience! I'd love to hear how it turns out for you. What made you decide to go Dolciani over VideoText? Dolciani looks attractive for my oldest. She is easily reduced to tears because she expects to understand concepts right away, so I hesitate to use AoPS with her. Although, I do have the kids using BA along side of RS. Right now my idea is to continue with RS-G along with shoring up the basic understanding of fractions (mult./div.), decimals, and precents with the RS card games, and then reviewing with the Key To series. With my subsequent children, I hope Dr. Cotter will have Level F completed to take some of this guess work out of it all. Once I feel like she has a good handle of all these concepts, I hope to move her into a Pre-Algebra. I'm not confident that she'll like RS-G (all the drawing), but I looked over and love what is covered in G (wonder if this will change once we actually work through the lessons...hmm). Since she likes to work as independently as possible, DD was happy to see that the lessons in G are written to the student. If she has trouble with it right away, I might hold off on G for a little while. Lots to think about... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirabillis Posted May 13, 2014 Share Posted May 13, 2014 Right now my idea is to continue with RS-G along with shoring up the basic understanding of fractions (mult./div.), decimals, and precents with the RS card games, and then reviewing with the Key To series. With my subsequent children, I hope Dr. Cotter will have Level F completed to take some of this guess work out of it all. Once I feel like she has a good handle of all these concepts, I hope to move her into a Pre-Algebra. I'm not confident that she'll like RS-G (all the drawing), but I looked over and love what is covered in G (wonder if this will change once we actually work through the lessons...hmm). Since she likes to work as independently as possible, DD was happy to see that the lessons in G are written to the student. If she has trouble with it right away, I might hold off on G for a little while. Lots to think about... Are they really working on a Level F? When I was last researching all this (albeit 2 years ago), there was no such thing on the horizon. Wouldn't that be wonderful - for all my littler ones coming down the pipe? Level G is pretty good. It's completely independent thus far, and we do it as a supplement on off-days from the Pre-A stuff. I find it very easy so far. He's maybe 1/4 or 1/3 of the way through, and it's been very much review thus far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisB Posted May 16, 2014 Author Share Posted May 16, 2014 Yup. They have tentative plans for Level F in 2017--excited about that! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirabillis Posted May 19, 2014 Share Posted May 19, 2014 Dolciani looks attractive for my oldest. She is easily reduced to tears because she expects to understand concepts right away, so I hesitate to use AoPS with her. Although, I do have the kids using BA along side of RS. AoPs Pre-Alg was a shocking change for my son. Literally brought him to tears. A really mathy kid, who just got done doing MathCounts math competition. Far different from RS - and Singapore... I'm still hoping to use it at least supplementally, as I think it's great, but it's tough. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirabillis Posted May 19, 2014 Share Posted May 19, 2014 Excited about the Level F possibility. While Singapore worked great for my son transitionally in 5th/ 1/2 of 6th - my non-mathy daughter coming up would thrive in a continued RS environment. She's starting Level E next Sept - so hoping it will be ready by the following school year. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisB Posted May 19, 2014 Author Share Posted May 19, 2014 F is slated for 2017, unfortunately. Wished it was sooner. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mirabillis Posted May 19, 2014 Share Posted May 19, 2014 OK, then for my others (ages 8,6,4 & 2) :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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