elmerRex
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Posts posted by elmerRex
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HOW are you using Saxon?
Are you working the program as prescribed and going over the corrections each day? How is she doing with the lessons? Is she making a 85% or better on each lesson the first time around?
I would change the way that I do math, but I don't think that I would make completing TWO lessons a day my immediate goal, but I would put changes in place to try and get her to point where she can do that, if she so chooses.
Do you sit with her during the lesson to ensure that she understands everything before she begins the problem sets?
Is she focused while working the lesson and the problem set, or is she daydreaming and distracted?
How long does it take her to do a Saxon Math lesson?
What grade is she getting on her first attempt with a math lesson?
What procedure does your family use to make corrections?
How many days does she do math each week?
Does she know all math facts fluently?
Does she understand regrouping?
Instead of increasing the number of lessons she does each day, I would time my child each day to see how long it takes her to work through a lesson. Then I would add 10 minutes extra to her math time on her schedule and instruct her that "by her grade, she should do math for XX minutes each day. Work quickly and just pause in the next lesson when your time finishes." Look at the lessons ahead of time, some lessons are very short and naturally pair up well, so on some days I would have her do two lessons, but only when the lessons are short and connected.
I would also make math a 6-7 day a week subject. She will naturally get ahead by simply working more steadily.
Saxon Math 54 has 136 lessons in the 3rd edition so I suspect 1st edition has some fewer lessons than that. By working 6 days a week, 1 lesson a day, she can complete the whole book in about 20 weeks.
IF Saxon Math works for her, she is steady in her pacing, diligent in her daily work and well supported by teachers then she can finish Math 54, Math 65 and start on Math 76 in the same year with out doubling lessons. Just gradual, systematic and diligent work will get her there.
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Hello - I am not a Mathematician and I work in technology. At the end of the day I have realized this - I learned geometry, algebra, calculus, etc., etc. and for the last +30 years the only Maths I do is using numbers, that too addition, multiplication, division and subtraction, in MS Excel!
Long story short, I believe and strongly believe in fundamentals.
I do too. I come from a country with a strong respect for fundamentals and hard work. For us, we find it easier to teach very intensive and in detail in the early years and then relax once child has a strong foundation and mastery of the basics. This means that child can focus on strictly problem solving sooner.
I do NOT like the US approach towards division, fractions and found Hard Maths book to be good in the sense it does a very good job in nailing the fundamentals thru addition puzzles, base-8 intro, distributive property and in-depth fractions, decimals and divisions. I have the worksheet book and will be using it during the summer vacation. I do not remember how HMfE does fractions, decimals, divisions because we taught those things at home, and used Saxon Math also for those topics. I really did not like the way that HMfE talked about distributive property though.
Which is why was looking to see if there's any website which can gauge the student's strength and automatically up the exercises. Have you heard of KhanAcademy? You might like that as an option for your family.
Now - again from September 2017 till end of academic year 2018 I would like to do this:
- Re enforce the things taught in summer via work-sheets. If you like HMfE then go to the next book. If you finish HMfE and did NOT like the book, then begin to look for a new series. There are many out there.
Some series that are about topics can be great for focusing and building up skills step by step to mastery.
- Teach him problem solving skiils and THANK YOU: I will definitely look into "Process Skills in Problem Solving" If child really struggles with understanding word problem, it is helpful to go down 1 or 2 levels lower than they need to be by grade. The Process Skills books are not long books and you can finish each book in 1 month if you do 1-2 pages a day, but it will provide much practice with reading and understanding word problems.
- Move forward to next topics, more advanced. THANK YOU: I have just now looked into Saxon 65 but nowhere they have samples of what's inside. Its difficult to buy something - blind! Was thinking of buying something similar to : Hard Math but for middle school IMLEM Plus Edition by same author. As it seems you are well aware of the Saxon 65 book can you compare perhaps with the ToC of the book I mentioned and let me know? Saxon Math books are lesson-based and Saxon Math 65 does not have chapters by topic. Some book selling websits offer samples of the book. Many schools have the books online for viewing so you can do a google search for Math 65 PDF and find it on a school website, I'm sure. 1 small problem I see is multiple books of this Saxon series. I do not know this. My family uses exactly 3 Saxon books. Saxon Math 54, Saxon Math 65 and Saxon Algebra 1. We do not have multiple books to go with them. My son tends not to follow the set pattern, so I tend to jump from topic to topic. In other words when we attempted Permutations/Combinations he loved it but with distributive properties he had difficulty. So I dropped it and moved to area and then over time slowly came back to it off and on. Finally, he grasped it. I do not know which topics your son has mastered yet, or which need more work. Saxon Math books are lesson-based. So Math 65 does not have chapters by topic. Saxon Math is meant to be done by the book. Every problem in every lesson, is to be done in order. Saxon Math 54 has more than 4000 problems in it for the student to solve. Our children solve each and every one of them.
- THANK YOU: I'll avoid the Maths Circle for now as I don't have a group. On a side note - this organization has started something relatively new. For a $50 donation, they can send over the complete class notes. As they don't have online classes they have introduced this. My son is thriving in problem solving books now that he is firm in all the basics and knows his fundamentals fluently. He is able to think through the problem closely and carefully. He is never straining to remember how a concept goes and when he identifies a calculation to be done, he knows how to perform it correctly and quickly.
Once again - thank you!
Many seem to think that Beast Academy is best as a supplement, not the main program, because it doesn't include enough practice.
In my opinion Saxon Math is NOT a supplement. In my opinion, success with Saxon Math means accepting it as "all or nothing" method.
- Re enforce the things taught in summer via work-sheets. If you like HMfE then go to the next book. If you finish HMfE and did NOT like the book, then begin to look for a new series. There are many out there.
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I wrote a review of Hard Maths for Elementary. It is on this site some where, but I can't link. Use Google and search "Hard Math for Elementary Review elmerRex" and you should find it.
If you want to have more practice for material in the HMfE book, then get the workbook that goes with the textbook. That is probably easiest way to add in more practice.
There is a series called Process Skills in Problem Solving that is very good for helping students to learn problem solving strategies and builds up word-problem solving skills bit by bit. I have not used them before, but have read many recommendations.
Beast Academy I have never used. I have been told many times it is great, but it seems very expensive too me. After Saxon Math 54 and Math 65, my children find the samples very easy and pass the placement exams very well. It's very popular, but too me it isn't worth it just for a supplement, yet many report that it's best as a supplement because of not enough practice to be all by itself but I guess that varies by child.
My children need much practice for the fundamentals to gain full fluency and mastery. Then, they are able to go on ahead at much faster pace. We do a lot of work to have a very powerful foundation.
But I have struggled to find a good next step for our children.
Math Circle is more a social event in my country, so it'd be difficult to have a math circle with just 1 child. Do you have more children that you could begin to tutor with your son?
If not, I would not get a book for Math Circles.
Would you like other suggestions for resources instead?
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Thanks for your reply elmerRex, great food for thought.
Here's a few of the problems from CWP - page 32-33:
158+93+42
997+605
126-75
163-92
85x5
462x5
620/5
905/5
There are a lot of suggested worked examples, but my initial thoughts were why not pull out the calculator and be done with it?
Is the child allowed to see the problems while they work them? Or must they go by hearing only? When they are not mastered with the technique, my children find it easier to look at the problem while they figure it in their head until they gain more fluency with the technique. Only my oldest can do these problems by ear only and that is after a couple of years of regular learning and practice.
Here is how I would be coaching a child to do each of those problems mentally.
Always find tidy numbers where you can.
158+93+42 becomes 158 + 93 + 40 + 2 becomes 160 + 40 + 93 becomes 200 + 93 = 293
997+605 becomes 997 + 602 + 3 becomes 1000 + 602 = 1602
126-75 becomes (100 + 26) - 75 becomes 100-75 + 26 becomes 25 + 26 = (25 + 25) + 1 = 51
163-92 becomes 100 + 63 - 92 becomes 100-92 + 63 becomes 8 + 62 + 1 becomes 70 + 1 = 71
85x5 becomes (80+5) x 5 becomes 400 + 25 = 425
462x5 becomes (400 + 60 + 2) x 5 becomes 2000 + 300 + 10 = 2310
620/5 becomes (600 + 20) / 5 becomes 120 + 4 = 124
905/5 becomes (900 + 5) / 5 becomes 180 + 1 = 181 and here, since my child wouldn't know 5*18 rote, we'd work back from 5*20 (Which they know by rote) 5*20=100, so that's too big. 5*19=100-5 or 95, so obviously 5*18=19, or 5*180=190.
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I also think that using a video to teach maths is not ideal. Certainly not at that level. Our family is ESL so we read the texts and teach our children, from the texts for Math 54 and Math 65.
My opinion is that the parent READING and TEACHING the material is just superior instruction. The books are not hard to understand. We used 3rd edition.
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What was the problem?
Was it meant to have child use simplification/estimation or where they asked to be exact when they answered? ?
We do some years of training with the mentals maths with the goal of having children capable of doing flash anzan competition, but I don't feel it's necessary. But for our children its useful. For us, advanced mental maths comes to be useful in that it gives the child tremendous confidence and training them to juggle numbers in their head helps them. Also it teaches them good habits to organize numbers mentally in their mind.
However I would not slow down other work to gain this skill. We are not going to compete internationally so being quick with 5 digits is enough. What does your currency go up to?
I want my children to be able to confidently use 5 digits because in this country you have 2-3 digits for dollars and 2 more digits for cents.
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We use the eBook version of Saxon Math 54 and Math 65 with all of our children. I highly recommend it. We do not skip problems, but I feel experienced enough now that I could skip if I needed to now. Though you may not need to skip anything. You can read my review of Saxon Math 54 here.
Just completing 1 lesson a day and all of the investigations, Math 54 can be done in 136 days. If you start now and work diligently through the summer, you will be done with the book right by the time that school starts in the fall.
Since he tested into Math 54, you could begin that book with him now. There doesn't seem to be a strong need to accelerate with Saxon Math, but if I wanted to accelerate here is what I would do.
1) I would schedule math for the most productive period of the day.
2) Commit myself and my student to reading each lesson and working out all of the examples together (to be sure that lessons are fully understood) and immediately giving similar problems to make sure that enough practice is gained with the new skill. Then supervising/pacing the student as they complete the mixed Lesson practice.
3) Make Math a 7 day a week subject
4) (optional) Work 4 day sup-plan and a 3 day sub-plan. Where your son will do 2 lessons a day, some days and do only 1 lesson a day on the other day, depending on the student and the lessons themselves. This will let you do 10 or 11 lessons a week, instead of just 7
Sun--Mon--Tues--Wed--Thu--Fri--Sat So for a week, the number of lessons that I'd do are like this
....2.......1.......2.......1.........2......1........2..
or like this
Sun--Mon--Tues--Wed--Thu--Fri--Sat
....1.....2..........1........2........1........2......1..
On days that we do 2 lessons, we would read through both lessons fully. Work all of the new lesson problems and do the complete Mixed Practice problem set from the 2nd lesson.
You should look in the mixed practice for the 1st lesson to see if the new concept is practiced/assigned in that set, if so do those problems, for the additional practice of the new skill.
For us, Saxon Math is very, very succesful, but we do not ask our children to do it independently. We teach every lesson and supervise closely to be sure that work done is work done right, and work done swiftly.
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I have a question about original Saxon Math...
I am not an expert, but I have shared my observations and thoughts. I have a Saxon Algebra 1 book that I think is 1st edition.
My understanding, John Saxon wrote his series because of problems his students were having. I understand too that he even have away books to high schools where the math programs were struggling, and the math scores rose.
So.... I am picturing the grade 9 class of fresh struggling math students.... I assume they would use Algebra 1/2..... presumably some of many students really were not ready for it..... Same with older students that were in the school... They might not have started at the best level for them..... Or did the schools do placement tests or something?
The first book written was Algebra 1, not Algebra 1/2. So Students--no matter their background--would have used Saxon Algebra 1 in those early days.
My "1st" edition of Saxon Algebra 1 has 126 lessons.
The first 110 lessons are marked "Basic Course" but then the next 15 lessons 111-126, are marked as "Additional Topic". There are 4 Enrichment Lessons in the Appendix. So, if teachers classes needed more days per lesson, they could afford to take that time (180 school days - 126 lessons = 54 extra days for lessons, if doing all 126 lessons. There are 180 school days - 110 basic lessons = 70 extra school days if NOT oing the "Additional Topics".
Students who understand the lessons (either by reading and discussing, or having teacher explain and discussing),then go through the practice exercises.
Here is more of my opinion, but I hope that it can be helpful to you. If not, ignore and forgive me, please.
I think that allowing students to dawdle while they are doing the exercises (especially if the student is "struggling") is a disruption to their learning.
It is far better if you make sure that their mind stays put on the math so that they are building up the correct, ingrained mastery of the material. Many children who are "bad at" or "don't enjoy" math have learned through years of bad habits to be inattentive while they are doing their work. This increases their mistakes, which increases their frustration, which decreases their desire to pay attention and put forth the energy to learn. It is a negative cycle that wears down on the students spirit.
Instead, to boost students spirit make sure that the student digests the lesson from the book, you may do several problems together. Then stay near-by or with the student and moving at a brisk pace, work the problems together and aloud.
In this book, gaining competency and fluency in the skills of the first 15 lessons are crucial!!!
In lessons 1-15 students will drill the most fundamental procedures over and over again to gain competency and fluency at them. Students are taught background concepts about the number system that they are familiar with from primary school, and gradually learn/master how to perform fraction arithmetic, simplify complex/convoluted expressions, evaluate expressions, manipulate integers and terms..
These are all things that many students of maths do not master soon enough in many of their traditional PreAlgebra/Algebra 1 courses. The concepts tend to be "easy", so students "get it", and they do not gain the attention to detail for it that would mean fluency. Thus students arrive to lessons on Differentials and are 50/50 likely to mess up something simple like simplifying expressions or manipulating integers and terms appropriately.
Still just trying to picture how that would have worked and if that affects how things might work with my kids.
Sent from my SM-T530NU using Tapatalk
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I've been thinking about this lately as I'm contemplating sending my little ones to school along with the big ones. One of my friends recently said "Well, if you're planning to send them in 4th or 5th, what's the point in homeschooling before then?"
It really got me thinking. What do you think the benefits would be for the child to homeschool K-3 for example, but then go to public school?
Opportunity to lay infinitely stronger foundation, with less stress.
At first we kept them out because our oldest son was immature for his age at K and we wanted him to be successful when he started, but now seeing his progress in relation to his peers, I do not trust the local public schools at all to teach my children well during the vulnerable time so we make sure that all my children master all the basics at home.
Academics are very important to us and at home we can and do lay strong foundation. My children may go to English speaking public school in later grades, but locally, grades K-3 is when all foundations for literacy and numeracy are laid and after that students are expected to use that foundation going forward,
My friends kids in the local public school their parents spend extra on tutors and Kumon so that he can learn to read and do maths well. Kids are in school for 6 hours and then need lessons to learn all the things that they did not learn correctly, or were not even taught in school.
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We start with Saxon Math 54, but a friend wants to know about the lower grades books. Can anyone give a review?
How does the child like the program? How did they learn the materials? What are the best ways to tweak it for success? Etc.
Thank you.
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I do not think it's important for primary age children to train like professional mathematicians, but I do want my children to be able to be on competitive level with other children in our home country by end of year 3.
That's what I figured. You have come to the right place for ideas! I will try to find some threads; in particular, I recall an old, long thread by quark that had lots of possible resources to use in this situation - I'll add the links if I can find them.
To be clear, your "year 3" is 8 years old? Or 9? Are you in the US? How are the child's English language skills?
Yes, we are in the US and year 3 is 8 years old. His English grammar is better than mine. Has good reading and vocabulary but not good with comprehending long sentences of explanation in a book.
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I suggested OP post over here for AoPS experiences more relevant to younger, accelerated learners. As far as I can tell, the child is around 8 y.o. and has worked in Saxon algebra 1.
OP, you might get more targeted explanations if you elaborate on your student's current situation and needs. For example, whether you already finished Saxon Algebra 1 and how was that experience, whether you're looking for a full program or just supplemental ones, whether you're in a "holding pattern" regarding more acceleration, etc. Most especially, you might get some great suggestions for alternatives if you determine that AoPS is not a fit at this time.
Thank you for helpful links. Our math programme looks like this:
Eldest is in Year 3 now and others are in Year 2 and Year 1.
Year 1: We do Math 54 and Math 65 in one year. We do Math 54 and 65 this way--parent explains the section and goes over lesson problems with the students then the kids do the Saxon work --every problem, every time, every day. Parent checks and student corrections are made write away. Student writes answers in notebook and grows a math book.
We give 1-3 word problems a day also and include more topics from Hard Math for Elementary Students for interests. Kid does local math contest for experience.
In summer after Math 65 kids do as much of Saxon Algebra as they can (so far about 95 lessons) orally and/or with the white board. This is gentle enough for early years and sets a great foundation. Kids study abacus/anzan.
Year 2: We do full program of Math in Focus for 1 year: Child uses Textbook, Activities, Enrichment, and for gradual review we use Extra Practice, Reteach and Assessments. Child does extra topics from Hard Math for Elementary Students for their interests and finishes Saxon Algebra 1.
In summer, students have abacus/anzan and word problems every day.
Year 3: We have decisions to make. My oldest is not having a productive maths year because we do not know what to do. We are doing random topics based on interests but it is not a daily, gradual thing.
We could....
- Continue geometry and special interest topics. Very time intense and unpredictable.
- get next two levels of Math in Focus. I can not find this course as PDF and the full program of MiF is expensive, but it is easy with the Saxon foundation and the MiF format is perfect for young child. MiF is easy on parent to teach and easy for child to read and study with. Many components make it expensive but the child can master all the material and can work alone many days.
- We could get Saxon Algebra 2, but child would need parent to be teacher daily because the format is not easy to self study.
- We could buy series from country with good maths education programme.
- We could buy AoPS books.
Year 3 is the first serious year for us and it's not okay for student to not study maths.
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Didn't you ask this as two separate questions about a week ago? I thought you got quite a few answers then. If they weren't what you were looking for, maybe more details of why you are asking would help you get the answers you need?
Someone asked me to make this question here in this section also so I did.
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I would like to know about the cases where Beast Academy/Art of Problem Solving books were bad fits for your student.
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If Art of Problem Solving books was a bad fit for your family can you tell me why?
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Sure, sorry. One of the areas I think Primary Mathematics is especially strong is in covering the basic fundamentals (nuts and bolts, if you will). These include covering things like the basic algorithms (like column addition and multiplication and long division) as well as mental math strategies. PM also develops a bar-diagram method of solving word problems. These strengths are not limited to "the basics," but by "prosaic" I meant the arguably "boring" parts of arithmetic that students need to learn
(unless they are some sort of super-intuitive).
BA at times seems to take these basic skills as a "given." They may go very deep on a particular skill, and then just say a kid should know multiplication. That might work for the outlier type student. Mine is a smart kid, but fairly typical in learning skills better from an organized progression.
So the strength of PM was giving a straightforward (and fairly efficient) methodical coverage of the basics. The downside is much of this stuff is "boring." Necessary, but...
So to provide more joy, a sense of challenge, and out-of-the-box problem-solving Beast Academy filled a nice place as a great supplement. BA type materials make my boy more interested in learning "the basics" so he can do this other sort of work. So in our little home program, I've tried to balance materials that make the basics comprehensible while providing challenges that make mathematics fun. For my kid, BA was fun. So now (as a 7th Grader) he goes to the Math Counts/Math Club on Thursdays after school (tonight) and that's normal for him.
BA does a great job adding the sort of Math Circle/Math Lab problem-solving skills for elementary school kids. It is not the only great resource, but a very good one IMO. It would not have served us as a "spine" for basic math instruction, but there are plenty of other option to fill that need. BA is it's own thing. I love it for what it is. I only wish they'd produced it earlier. But we enjoyed the experience while it lasted, and have continued on with Art of Problem Solving, the big-brother to BA.
And my kid loved the comic book style and (maybe more so) the storyline aspect to the books.
I hope that's more clear.
Bill
Thank you both Spy Car and WendyRoo.
Yes very clear to me now.
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Honestly, we're not a math tricks and games kinda family. Tell us what's going on with the concepts, explain when/why we might need to use it, make sure we have the procedures down, call it a day. BA felt gimmicky and the pages were too busy for me. We had some fun with it in grade 3 but I could never use that as a spine over SM.
Yes. I am wary of teaching "tricks" that cloud or confuse the growing of a childs understanding. Thank you for this comment.
My DS did the 3rd grade BA books as a supplement to Singapore CA Standards Ed. but the publication schedule was too slow and BA isn't as comprehensive in terms of topics covered. Maybe by the time all of the BA books are published there won't be so many gaps, but this was a few years ago.
Since you used the books and if you look at the coverage now, do you feel it is more comprehensive? I think that the topics covered are "not right" but I was not educated in America so all US Math looks "not right" to me :laugh:
Probably not the type of reason you're looking for, but my son hated the comic style... He's always hated cartoons and things that aren't realistic and just couldn't get over it to enjoy the math side. He said it was "babyish."
Also, we had already been won over by Singapore...
My eldest would hate the cartoons too!
it was abysmal as a spine for my kids and one kid in particular did not learn as much from it as I had thought they would.Please can you tell me why it is a bad spine for kids in your family. For the child who did not learn as much as you thought, can you explain why?
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We got ahead of the publication schedule. Otherwise, we'd have continued.
As much as I appreciate BA (big fan) it would not have served us well as a stand-alone program. Primary Mathematics (Singapore) was often better for developing more prosaic elements of my kid's math education, which BA sometimes gave short shrift. But for introducing math competition type thinking and providing a stretch BA was superlative. So a mix of resources was best for us.
Bill
Please I am sorry to annoy but I am ESL, can you please explain the sentences with red.
I did look up them in the dictionary, but do not understand shrift. I asked the computer and prosaic and superlative have 3 meanings. Can you clarify what you mean please?
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If Beast Academy was a bad fit for your family can you tell me why?
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We also like Saxon Math. We start with Math 54, Math 65 and then use Algebra 1. However my son has been able to apply everything he learned in Saxon other places so I do not think its a Saxon trait that students can only do exact math format of Saxon.
It is a sign of poor teachers and support if you struggled in all math after Saxon.
I think it is normal for someone who has been away from something for years to struggle with being crafty and creative the moment that they come back to it. Most people do not use and think about math out side of class.
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Do you ever have a long, a very long week of the childs not cooperating and not understanding? I had such a week.
On Saturday we began the topic of rates. These are the childs reactions:
Saturday: :eek: (Panic)
Sunday: :huh: (I don't get it)
Monday: :confused1: (I don't know)
Tuesday: :glare: (I don't care)
Wednesday: :sad: (I don't like this)
Thursday: :thumbdown: (I don't want to do this. Its too hard)
Friday: After I have go over this 3x with you again, now Baba comes to say the exact same things that I said Sunday and magically you understand?! Because Baba is a good teacher.
I feel that it is hard to be the pleasant and calm teacher i want to be when my kid is making me feel :cursing:.
Maybe I will send this one to school.
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How do you help your child to benefit from audio-books in the 2nd language? My children struggle to listen to audio-books in the 2nd language, the readers go at a native rate and it is not easy enough for them to enjoy it.
Is there a strategem for using audio-books to help the kids to enjoy the story in a language that is not their native language?
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Also, I do not know how Discovering Math 7 compares to Math in Focus Courses 1-3, but I find the format of Math in Focus very, very friendly, not densely packed words.
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If you have used AoPS PreAlgebra then can you please tell the reading level of the text?
Saxon 5/4 question
in K-8 Curriculum Board
Posted · Edited by elmerRex
I do not understand. Is she missing questions in the lessons and practice because of math facts?
If your student is doing well in math lessons with Saxon, but not doing well on drill sheets then I would deviate from HOW we do drill.
I would focus on learning maybe 3 or 4 math facts at a time and doing drills on just those, using both multiplication and division.