Saxon Success Stories?

[Carolinagirl1]

My daughter is just starting 7th. I'd like for her to complete Calculus by 12th. We have been using CLE and are planning to move quickly through CLE 7 and 8 in this year to complete pre algebra so that she can start Algebra 1 in 8th. CLE does have an Algebra 1 curriculum but then we'd need to move on to something else for the rest of the math sequence. I'm wondering if I should just switch her to Saxon 8/7 or Algebra 1/2 now since we are at the beginning of 7th and just follow the Saxon sequence. 

 

I've been searching the boards for ideas and have seen recommendations for Dolciani, Lial's, Foerster's, Chalkdust, etc....There seem to be quite a few negative reviews for Saxon. My daughter seems to be on target for a science related field of study so I would like her to be well prepared for math and science for college, and of course I want her to be well prepared for the SAT. 

 

Can anyone who has used Saxon's entire sequence give me some success stories and let me know how well their student was prepared for standardized testing and college math?

[Guest]

My ds#1 went through the entire Saxon sequence (1st-calculus). He's now a senior in college pursuing his degree in engineering technology.

 

And I have had two sons (ds#3 & ds#4) who placed directly into college algebra on placement tests for dual enrollment after completing Saxon Algebra 1.

[cbollin]

Not the whole way, but Oldest started in Saxon 87 in 7th grade, Alg 1 in 8th, (jacob's geometry in 9th as we wanted a full year proof based just because we did), Alg 2 in 10th (passed CLEP college algebra after this book along with 20 study lessons from the DIVE cd), Advanced in 11th. (got 28 on math section of ACT after that and it was high enough to meet her scholarship needs.)  Then in 12th, for calculus she did a free non credit bearing MOOC (coursera) calculus 1.  I wanted her to feel the college style. She started in Calc 1 in college with the other electrical engineering majors.  She's currently a senior in electrical engineering, computer science, and math, because 3 majors are just a way to over achieve, right?  Originally the math was going to be a minor.  but no...  had to add in the course overload didn't she?

and yes, she's still got high GPA in those courses in major. anything would have worked with her in high school.

 

Middle kiddo did Saxon 87 in 7th, followed in grade 8 with Alg 1/2 (she needed more time) Alg 1, (then jacobs geometry because dad liked that), Alg 2, Advanced in grade 12.  She's not math major. Planning art as major or creative writing, or preschool teacher.  Her ACT math score exceed "college readiness benchmark", and was high enough to place her into the one math class she'd need for her intended major at first choice college.  She's in gap year currently so I can't say how she will do in math in a year.

 

oh, and we're not pure-saxon users either.  We used mfw's lesson plans. gasp. They schedule very specific problem sets for above average students instead of all problems every time. gasp!  and even more gasping from the pure saxon fans is that each of oldest and middle dd did the advanced book in 2 semesters.  But we lived just fine in spite of not being pure users.  mileage will vary.  but that's our saxon success stories.

[Mike in SA]

The BASIS school system uses Saxon all the way through calculus, and have plenty of top-scoring students.  You really don't need more than that.

 

They have some interesting rules about it, including:

 

No section or problem is to be skipped - ever

Teachers must provide additional content in class to make each lesson complete (Saxon does a lot of spoon-feeding - BASIS wants the students to get the full picture in each lesson)

Tests should be comprehensive, and students who have issues should receive timely remediation so those issues are corrected early

Provide lots of opportunity for remediation

 

 

All in all, your success depends largely on 1) your ambitions, and 2) your willingness to address the robotic nature of the texts.  If your ambitions are to be adept at application without having to think, then Saxon works great.  If those ambitions include higher abstractions in mathematics, then you will need to address that either offline during each year, or after completing calculus.

[LinRTX]

My have done Saxon through Calculus. Oldest majored in EE (had a 3.9 GPA in college). Second majored in business with a programming emphasis (graduated with a 4.0), third is in nursing, but tutored math in college. My youngest is a high school senior, but scored really high on her SAT and plans on majoring in math.

 

Saxon did well for all of my children. 

 

Linda

[Ann.without.an.e]

We used it all the way through with dd.  She prepped and took the AP calc exam and scored very well on the math portion of standardized testing. She is a student at Duke university and in her first class she was known as one of only 4 students who could actually understand the math in the course, making her one of the "go to" people for help.  That being said, she is actually an english major but has considered switching to engineering.

 

 

[mschickie]

My nephew used it all the way through and now has his Masters in Chemistry.

[G5052]

We also used CLE, but switched to Saxon Algebra 1/2 after CLE Math 7 because the approaches are indeed different, and I wanted a slower ramp-up. I had them take Saxon tests until they got below 80% and then started there.

 

My oldest used it through Advanced Math, and scored in the 700's on the SAT with study. He aced his college math classes and is a junior in Accounting with a minor in Business Analytics.

 

It was not a good fit for my younger one. We switched her to other choices after Algebra I.

 

[...................]

My son did only Saxon from 1st through 9th grade. He did one year of Math Club which definitely increased his problem solving skills.... He finished Algebra 2.  He scored a 680 on the SAT as a 9th grader.  :)  He tested a perfect score in the Community College test Accuplacer.  And he will start with credit courses for math at the CC at age 15.

 

My son is definitely in the gifted range, talked early, walked early, started reading fairly normal age.  Extremely verbal, but in math he;s "Bright" and "competent" and "probably in the gifted range" according to his PhD math club leader who taught math to dozens of kids over her career...

 

So, he's not a genius.  Just bright and competent at math and problem solving.  

 

Saxon worked for us.  

 

I will say however that, unfortunately, he hated it.  So I don't know how much that matters but there it is. :)

[Ellie]

My daughter is just starting 7th. I'd like for her to complete Calculus by 12th. We have been using CLE and are planning to move quickly through CLE 7 and 8 in this year to complete pre algebra so that she can start Algebra 1 in 8th. CLE does have an Algebra 1 curriculum but then we'd need to move on to something else for the rest of the math sequence. I'm wondering if I should just switch her to Saxon 8/7 or Algebra 1/2 now since we are at the beginning of 7th and just follow the Saxon sequence. 

 

I've been searching the boards for ideas and have seen recommendations for Dolciani, Lial's, Foerster's, Chalkdust, etc....There seem to be quite a few negative reviews for Saxon. My daughter seems to be on target for a science related field of study so I would like her to be well prepared for math and science for college, and of course I want her to be well prepared for the SAT. 

 

Can anyone who has used Saxon's entire sequence give me some success stories and let me know how well their student was prepared for standardized testing and college math?

 

I have many friends whose children did Saxon all the way and were absolutely ready for college math and science. They are just not members here. :-)  Janet in WA, who used to be a member here, graduated all four of her sons with Saxon.

 

I used to have a friend who went to several teacher conventions as a Saxon rep, before there were such things as Saxon reps. :-) I went with her a couple of times. There was a steady stream of teachers during the whole convention who had nothing but raves for Saxon: more of their students were successful in algebra, more of them were taking more advanced maths, more of them were going into fields that required math.

 

Remember that you will mostly read negatives here, because people are looking for alternatives. The ones who are happy (with any product, really) usually don't post that.

 

If you decide to go to Saxon, you would have your daughter take the placement test, rather than just deciding between Math 87 and Alg. 1/2.

[Mike in SA]

 

Remember that you will mostly read negatives here, because people are looking for alternatives. The ones who are happy (with any product, really) usually don't post that.

 

Don't know if that's the reason why - in my limited experience, most mathematicians and physicists detest Saxon's lack of theory and abstraction. But, if you are going into an applied field (including chemistry and engineering), the fact of the matter is that there are many students who end up with perfectly happy lives after using Saxon. Odds decrease for theoretical fields, but a good student often succeeds regardless.

[hopskipjump]

Oldest went with Saxon the whole way (until Calculus - we switched to DO AP calc so someone else could teach her). She scored near-perfect on her ACT math section. She was almost an engineering major (changed her mind last minute).

 

Next two are also Saxon kids. So far - all is well!

 

I remember having the same concerns years ago and reading similar reviews - but we've had Great success with Saxon.

[Guest]

My husband used Saxon all the way through advanced mathematics, self study pretty much entirely. Continued it even when he switched to a Christian school for high school, and actually ended up teaching the class because the teacher wasn't qualified to teach calculus and was totally lost. He was valedictorian, went to a highly competitive and rigorous undergrad Christian college for engineering and left with top grades, then went to a top tier public university for his Masters in structural engineering, and finished in 3 semesters.

 

When he began with Saxon in 4th he was worst in his class at math, and was pulled back out to catch up at home. He now spends 8-12 hours a day essentially doing calcs and has been consistently the most technically skilled engineer at each place he has worked when it comes to getting back to basics, deriving tables and formulas, and checking the calcs of others.

 

He credits Saxon entirely. And yes, we use it with our children now. They are good at math naturally and have done well with our earlier grade programs and their standardized tests, but have needed the review and conceptual rigor of Saxon to really shine. Lots of programs are excellent but the results we have seen from the early Saxon editions have been fantastic, and my husband has never hit a math problem he cannot tackle or approach to solve in his college and professional careers. He prefers physically building things and breaking down real time forces and materials to theoretical applications, and that's probably one of the main reasons he didn't become a mathematician. But he'd have been capable of either.

 

Rah rah Saxon yay? :D

Edited August 17, 2017 by Arctic Mama

[BusyMom5]

Not the OP, but thank you all for the rave reviews!  We are using Saxon, and so far so good, but my oldest is only finishing Al 1 at this point ;)  

[Carolinagirl1]

It's been a little while since I wrote the original post. We've been on vacation for a few weeks without good service, but I wanted to say thank you sooooo much for all the great reviews! My decision is made! Since we are doing CLE now, we will finish CLE 7 and 8 this year by accelerating the lessons and then start Algebra 1/2 in 8th. Would love to hear more success stories!!

[OnMyOwn]

My dd followed up CLE 6 (I think -- it's been awhile now) with Saxon 1/2 and then Algebra 1 and Algebra 2. All went well for her until she was well into algebra 2. In hindsight, I don't think it was the fault of the program as much as some mistakes I made. Even though my dd was young, I thought she would be conscientious about checking her own work by the time she hit algebra 2 because she was always pretty diligent about things. Well, that was honestly not a good idea. It turns out that she felt so confident after watching the Art Reed dvd that she felt she could skip the practice problems for the new concept of the day. She also stopped checking her work at some point and never made corrections. As she neared the end of the book, even though she was still doing well on the tests, she was often taking 3 hours a day to do math. That was what clued me in to the problem. The other mistake, imo, was using the Art Reed dvds. When I realized my dd was having issues, I began watching those with her every day and I was really surprised at how riddled with errors they are and how little explanation is given about anything. Now, if my dd also read the text, then they probably would have been okay. She was fine with them for algebra 1/2 and algebra 1 because the concepts were more basic, but I think they may have added to the problem in algebra 2.

Anyway, we switched to DO and I went through his algebra 2 with her in about 2 months and all the lightbulbs went on, so it all worked out okay. She did precalculus with DO and is now currently back to using Saxon again for calculus with the Dive dvds because she really wanted a change. We may quickly run through DO afterwards to solidify everything because I do love how he explains things. I do still check her work and make sure she corrects her errors to give her some accountability.

 

ETA:  This starts out sounding like it may not be a Saxon success story, but I think, overall, it is.  We just had a few bumps along the way.

Edited September 7, 2017 by OnMyOwn

[Ellie]

It's been a little while since I wrote the original post. We've been on vacation for a few weeks without good service, but I wanted to say thank you sooooo much for all the great reviews! My decision is made! Since we are doing CLE now, we will finish CLE 7 and 8 this year by accelerating the lessons and then start Algebra 1/2 in 8th. Would love to hear more success stories!!

 

Be sure to have your children take the Saxon placement test first. They might place into Math 87 instead of Alg. 1/2. :-)

[....]

Would love to hear more success stories!!

 

My oldest uses the high school Saxon series.  I work through the book with her.  Her next book is Saxon Advanced Mathematics and then we might do the Calculus book (or we might just stop there with trig- whatever she wants to do).  She did Art of Problem Solving before switching to Saxon at Algebra 1.  She actually chose Saxon over AOPS for algebra (after looking at all the samples).  AOPS is very wordy and the Saxon pages are very clear-cut/here's your problems to solve.  I think that's why she chose Saxon over AOPS.

 

I think it's a solid program.  There is a ton of review.  Some of the lessons are just too long, IMO.  We have to break them up over two days, because neither of us have the attention span for that much math.   :tongue_smilie:  Dd15 does have a rock solid understanding of algebra, though.  And the geometry...sometimes she can figure out the geometry problems before I can - especially those "find the lateral surface area of this monsterhedron" problems.  Ack!  I hate the lateral surface area problems.

 

And I've been able to find our high school Saxon used.  There are a lot of used copies floating around on Ebay.  Once you reach Advanced Math, it seems like the used selection dwindles, though.

 

Not sure if my review helps you at all.  For the right kind of learner, I think it's a solid math program.