So I think I should reword my initial question. Thanks Ellie. What makes published instructional material, specifically workbooks by CLP, or Hoghton Mifflin, or Marshall Cavendish better than workbooks published by Harcourt (Complete Curriculum workbook) or Carson Dellosa (Spectrum Math or Comprehensive Curriculum) superior?

Thank you very much for the clarification!!I will say that my school district didn't get the memo. I did email them and ask their curriculum and they did give me a list of the textbooks, and the reading program that they were using at the time. So curriculum is just the Scope and Sequence. Does it contain methodology? Singapore math is a method and there are several instructional materials. I believe Primary math is published by Marshall Cavendish and MIF is published by Houghton Mifflin.

I do have a question. If the child is not learning in any way are they truly able to complete any workbooks? I know with my tutoring students they can't do anything in the workbook, and they can't do anything alone if I just hand it to them initially. But I can sit with them and teach them as we progress through it until they know what they are doing with autonomy. I guess even on a barebones level a child will still learn to read, do math, and write ... At the very least. They may also garner some decent content.

Another thread got me thinking about that. Why are workbooks never considered quite up to par when comparing them to curricula. I agree that not all workbooks are created equal, but not all curricula are either. Does anyone really know what the difference is? CLE I think would be considered curriculum but it is workbooks. Singapore is workbooks, as is GoMath and MIF. But those are curriculum. Is the only differentiation the teaching manual? And if so, are those people not using TMs just giving their kids workbooks. And by workbooks I mean those workbooks one can buy in book, stationary and department store. I don't think there is a right or wrong answer. I am just curious.

I think I should clarify, I am familiar with the Flash Kids Complete Series and the Comprehensive series. I have used both while tutoring. We don't have any currently because we are using other stuff. But I can still see them working effectively for certain families. Especially in a literature rich home where the child is expected to read about a variety of subjects and classic texts. My qualms were about the effectiveness beyond the earliest grades. But I am sure a savvy parent could make them work. I should note, some of the completely program books are just several single subject books put into one volume. Once you have been though enough of them you will realize that many of the worksheets are the same.

Yup! I use the TM for first for the story problems, the money cup and dictation. Sometimes I have to check something that had to be done in the title bar. Oddly my son knows exactly what to do then. But other than that I don't use them. But those things it is essential for. I just don't really like scripted lessons and thus far my son hasn't not understood anything yet. Oh and I use them to tell me what to count for the day. Hmm. I probably use them more than I think. There are some good things taught. Like addition twins. I never thought to explain them like that. My son got that swiftly. And the use of terms like congruent are good to get into the habit of saying.

If it were me I would use CLE as the main program because it is integrated and spiral. Each day's lesson involve a snippet of math from a variety of math subsets. I would then use MIF as supplement. You can then cut up a lesson into bits or skip parts more easily.

I am against the majority here. I think they can work in the right kind of home. First I should say I have never seen a comprehensive or complete workbook at a dollar store. I have seen cheap, fun stuff mostly. Or books that cover some basic skills. But nothing I would consider worth purchasing. But that being said, I think, even outside of the dollar store, not all workbooks are created equal. Some are much better than others. My son is a workbook lover and we use a lot of workbooks, by his choice. He had some spending money and he spent it at staples buying post it notes and the second grade spectrum math book! I was shocked at the time, but it made him happy. For language arts/reading/writing and math, in the early grades I really like the spectrum books. My son has done FLL1 and LLTL1, Singapore math, Go Math and he has gotten more from the spectrum workbooks than and of those curriculum. However I should note that k-3rd grade is easy for me to teach, and he learnt things like nouns, verbs, adjectives informally in our day to day lives. And math is just open and go and practice. We played games with manipulatives and learnt fractions and measurement while cooking. My son is also an independent and fast learner. Workbooks gives him independence and he only comes to me if he is confused. Because we live our day to day lives learning a lot of things these work perfectly for school time. Currently we do CLE. Which is workbooks. And most of the extra counting stuff we do when we go for walks. It is straightforward and we like it. I switched because of the integrated math and spiral. Then I chose to add the LA and reading because I liked the math so much. All in all I can't really tell you the big difference between curriculum and workbooks when we are comparing Primary Mathematics, Go Math, Spectrum Math, and CLE in the early grades. Is it that one comes with a guided TM and the others don't? For History we are using the Complete Book of US History. It has been the best thing we have found thus far. And it is a workbook technically. The Complete Geography book is not as good but it is sufficient and has way more than any early grade geography book I have found yet. I know a lot of people use Evan Moore books, especially Daily Science and they seem to be satisfied with those.

Yup! I never felt Elmer's was that good a glue. Scotch glue all the way. Lasts for ages and works!

Geocaching. Cross country running Life hack skills from YouTube Cooking Building a PC from scratch. Rebuilding a motorbike or car engine. Good time to start on a first car.

Here they start separating the upper elementary students via ability. The higher archiving students are in one class, the middle of the road students are in another and the students that need more assistance are in another class with the help of an aid. They do this will all the core subjects; math, language arts, science and social studies. As for pushing excelling kids, perhaps this is the time for parents to step up to the plate and be more involved in their child's education. There are ways outside of the school to push kids in a great environment. 4H clubs, robotics clubs, community leadership programs, mentoring programs, per tutoring. Students can self study. That is what I did. No one stopped me from learning as much as I could despite the fact that I was raised in an education system that taught to the lowest students. Students can enter writing competitions, math competitions. They can learn a foreign language or a musical instrument. They can join a community play.

But what happens to those students that do struggle? The ones that just don't have academic skill? The ones with learning disability? The ones that fall behind academically and struggle to keep up? Even more money and time is invested in them to the detriment of the more advanced students. There is already concern about the lower grades being too rigorous. At least by having minimum standards, those that can, have the option to be pushed and to excel.

Not an Ivy, but Kenyon is a top tier liberal arts college and it has taken on many students without AP credit, as our school district didn't have AP classes. I know quite a few peope that went there.

This video might clarify a few things. I don't know if CC will work. But I do see that there are a lot of issues with schools all over the nation not aligning. From the things I am reading in this thread it makes me believe it. What has to be understood is that CC isn't completely implemented. I think this school year is the first year for implementation across 45 US states. So some of the qualms that people already have are from things before CC. And the implementation won't really show its effects until the youngest students have been on the pathway for many years. So it might take a decade for the kinks to even out. Other nations seems to be able to have national standards. I think that they US can too. It just takes time.

I do know someone named Sparkle. Her mom must have thought it was a pretty name too.

CC was created as a MINIUM benchmark for all students in public schools across the country to meet. That way if little Johnny moves from Chicago to Seattle in grade 3 he is learning about the same thing. He isn't a year behind. Of course ideals don't always pan out in practice. But I have heard that military schools have been able to implement something similar for all their mobile students. Can anyone verify the legitimacy of that?

Check out www.readingbear.org. It is free and it is really good with demonstrating blends. It even has the lips to help a child say the sounds. You can do fast or slow blending. And initially the child can be a passive observer.

You probably nailed it. It isn't the testing that is the issue I think. It is the lack of feedback.

Yup! I was educated in Australia and we did testing all the time. Some subjects weekly. Other once a month. Every subject at least a term. And all subjects had 4 terms per year. I learnt and retained a lot. I am shocked when I hear about how little one remembers from highschool, let alone primary school. I am entirely baffled about the term "teaching to the test" I am not sure how to wrap my head around that grammatically. And frankly I assume that if a child is being taught they should be able to pass the test. Test anxiety is something I have never experienced personally. I don't know anyone that had it when I was in school. Maybe because testing was just a part of education. Also something that I was shocked to find out was that much of the testing in the. US is multiple choice. We very very seldom had multiple choice tests. We had short response about 80% of the time and long response for certain subjects. Math required us to show our working. And even if the answer was wrong in some cases we were given half a point for working. I distinctly remembering get 29.5 out of 30 in math class because I did a silly mistake and forgot to add a 0 to a number. All the working was correct. I also don't understand how testing stymies creativity. Sometimes creativity went a long way. Especially with long and short response answers. In many of my classes there were often many answers. A legal problem could have different solution, or a historical text could be interpreted in a certain way.

My name ends in an H and I was taught explicitly in second grade to say Aitch instead of Haitch.

Exactly. Neither way is right or wrong. It is regional. That is like telling someone that learnt is not a word. Or gaol is spelled incorrectly.

Nope. Elliot is pretty trendy in the 0-6 crowd.

Ahhh but they are. They are ruled for all grades. Yes I would love to know where to source these affordably in the states too.

For us, chores are just things one does as part of a family. It is a part of life. All things we do around the house are chores. We don't have any chore chart or allowance system. But we still call it chores.

One of my schoolgirl friends had the last name Butt. She was was timid to tell people too. Poor girl.