Guest Catherine1000 Posted December 4, 2014 Share Posted December 4, 2014 I have been looking at both Beestar and IXL for my child. Can anyone tell me about your experience with them? Thanks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tsuga Posted December 4, 2014 Share Posted December 4, 2014 There is a thread below on IXL that has some comparisons-- http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/465461-opinions-on-ixl-math-the-website/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunnyday Posted December 4, 2014 Share Posted December 4, 2014 My opinion is that IXL is kind of lame and can crush mathematical interest but it does what it says it does, whereas Beestar seems to need people coming on here shilling for it every couple of months, which doesn't bode well. 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vida Winter Posted December 4, 2014 Share Posted December 4, 2014 Khan Academy is better than either of these, in my opinion. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
azucena Posted December 4, 2014 Share Posted December 4, 2014 A vote for Dreambox, which we found much more engaging. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tsuga Posted December 5, 2014 Share Posted December 5, 2014 Azucena, do your kids not end up spending inordinate amounts of time on the play area of Dreambox? That drives me nuts and I finally said they can only do it at school. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kiwik Posted December 6, 2014 Share Posted December 6, 2014 We had a complete fail with dreambox. DS hated the abacus thing and found it hard to see (so did I). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mabelen Posted December 6, 2014 Share Posted December 6, 2014 My dd used both the free IXL and Beestar versions. She tolerated both. IXL is better at systematic drill. Beestar follows I believe a Texas school district scope and sequence so it would be systematic lesson reinforcement for those kids. They have a pay option which might be different. We tried Dreambox for a bit too. She liked it better for a while, then it started jumping in difficulty and it became too cumbersome to customize. For my dd, what works best is Math with mom giving immediate feedback. Right now we are using CLE 500 and she does it without complaint. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kiwik Posted December 9, 2014 Share Posted December 9, 2014 My opinion is that IXL is kind of lame and can crush mathematical interest but it does what it says it does, whereas Beestar seems to need people coming on here shilling for it every couple of months, which doesn't bode well. And everywhere else apparently. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ocelotmom Posted December 10, 2014 Share Posted December 10, 2014 Beestar is basically a weekly enrichment worksheet. That's all. Paying for it provides a weekly worksheet in more subjects. It's not really something you can use as a daily supplement, and definitely not a full curriculum. When we tried it, there were so many extremely high functioning kids doing it that the competition aspect was pretty much pointless. DS did enjoy the worksheets, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lisayvonne Posted December 26, 2014 Share Posted December 26, 2014 I'm with ocelotmom. DD also enjoys beestar worksheets. My opinion trends towards using both of them... Lisa Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
debi21 Posted December 29, 2014 Share Posted December 29, 2014 Wow, I think this is the first time I've seen a negative comment about DreamBox. We did the trial and I liked a lot of it in theory, except there was still too much timed stuff, let me flash this thing at you for two seconds and have my five (then four?) year old try to figure it out in this tiny amount of time. I felt like that worked against developing conceptual comfort, which was supposed to be the reason to choose DreamBox. The other problem, as mentioned above, was my son just went to the fun stuff or whatever - he did NOT want to do the lessons. Admittedly the different presentation might have been out of his comfort zone. That said, he also didn't love Xtra math. Dull and timed. IXL is dull but not timed, or not obviously time-is-running-out timed, so I am still considering it. Even though it was timed, for math facts, the one my son liked best was Reflex Math. While we had it he often whined about the timed aspect, but he still sometimes asks for that. I know nothing about beestar, but I notice no one has sounded excited about it. I am still looking for an online math supplement that is fun without timed pressure, so if anyone has any other recommendations... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pwicks Posted January 19, 2015 Share Posted January 19, 2015 Hi.. My DD is in 1st grade my DS is in kindergarten... both take well to math and I do Critical thinking company curriculum with them at home on top of Public school. (once I finish with my current books though I think I am going to switch to MM... total side note). ok so I have both Math seeds (it is by Blake learning who also does Reading eggs) and Dreambox. I had Math seeds because they gave it to me dirt cheap for a year long subscription when I renewed reading eggs.I got Dreambox because I thought mathseeds was too "slow paced" childish and boring.... I will be honest I didn't realize how much my kids picked up from mathseeds. They are doing analog time, fractions etc. Dreambox is not doing any of that. My daughter is generally more academic and does well with both Dream box and mathseeds. My son can't take all the manipulatives associated with Dreambox (10frames, abacus, etc.etc.) so he plays it for 15 minutes then ends up going to math seeds. Dreambox seems to be great to get the kids working with numbers... my kids are both quicker on visualizing math facts and problems... Mathseeds has a broader curriculum (although not very aggressive... yet still faster than the public school common core curriculum!!!). I am going to do a trial of IXL (myself I don't want to confuse the kids) and see if maybe it would be a good replacement for both programs when my current subscriptions expire. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crimson Wife Posted January 20, 2015 Share Posted January 20, 2015 My little one's school provided her an IXL account free and we did try it out a few times. She got bored with it fairly quickly each time so I decided to just supplement with Right Start, which is "hands-on" and much more engaging for her. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Zmom12 Posted January 10, 2018 Share Posted January 10, 2018 Last semester I found the Beestar free math program. My son really likes it. The best part, I get a progress report every week and can work with my kid on any skills that need more attention. I know for sure he understands the new math concept through the weekly reports to my email. He works really hard to get on the weekly honor roll. My son is really motivated and confident at school and I am more confident that I am helping them stay ahead of the curve. His teacher even pulled me aside to ask what I was doing differently. We will be starting Science and Social Studies for the Spring 2018 Semester in a few weeks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dmmetler Posted January 12, 2018 Share Posted January 12, 2018 Have you tried MobyMax? My tutoring kids seem to prefer it to IXL for practice, and it’s free. And, of course, Prodigy is a favorite (but has a lot of play for the amount of math they actually get). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashley Cocoe Posted February 6, 2023 Share Posted February 6, 2023 My son used to be a slow learner, he was not doing so well in his class before. My friend told me about the Beestar and I decided to try it for my son in the last three months. The Beestar math program is free and although it is free, it is pretty effective and we could see his improvement and he is doing well in his class currently. There is also an online math competition from Beestar which was held last October but my son missed it so we are planning to participate in March. Hope he can do the best in that competition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Blossom Jane Posted March 29, 2023 Share Posted March 29, 2023 On 2/5/2023 at 7:40 PM, Ashley Cocoe said: My son used to be a slow learner, he was not doing so well in his class before. My friend told me about the Beestar and I decided to try it for my son in the last three months. The Beestar math program is free and although it is free, it is pretty effective and we could see his improvement and he is doing well in his class currently. There is also an online math competition from Beestar which was held last October but my son missed it so we are planning to participate in March. Hope he can do the best in that competition. Hi i'm confusing to choose the online math program for kid just between Kumon and Beestar and most people say that Kumon is a bit expensive so can you answer that for me that which one would be the better one? Your suggestion would be highly appreciated. Thank you. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rosie_0801 Posted March 29, 2023 Share Posted March 29, 2023 48 minutes ago, Blossom Jane said: Hi i'm confusing to choose the online math program for kid just between Kumon and Beestar and most people say that Kumon is a bit expensive so can you answer that for me that which one would be the better one? Your suggestion would be highly appreciated. Thank you. You'd be better off starting a new thread than bumping such an old one. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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