Have you tried Lucy Calkins? I teach English 101 at a community college, and I am very impressed with the writing I'm seeing from my DD's 5th grade class. Her teacher says they are using this method, and she is a big fan. I will say that while college comp students do not often make huge gains over the 15 weeks that I see them, I definitely think precepts of good writing can be taught, especially to younger students who are willing to put in the necessary time and effort.

Wintermom, that is awesome! I have told my DD that I used to make a lot of "silly" mistakes in math, too. I think this will work really well for her. You guys are brilliant!

DD's teacher had them compose songs and then write out the scores, so they were learning music note values as fractions (dotted half note = 3 beats out of 4) and seeing a practical and interesting application.

I haven't read all of the responses, but my DD (who is not a math fan on the whole) really likes Hands-On Equations and Challenge 24. The latter has really helped with her fact fluency and confidence. She also enjoys learning math through music (rhythm = fractions).

Clementine, that is totally what I will do for my daughter. I know that less work will be an incentive that works for her. :) And Arcadia, I agree that sleep is a big factor. OneStepAtATime, I typed a long response to your helpful response, but it seems to have vanished. In short, I also wondered about eye issues. When DD was in first grade she used to miscopy nearly everything from the blackboard. The developmental optometrist said that she had some minor tracking problems, but nothing to be very concerned about. Indeed, her ability to copy accurately has improved greatly as she's gotten older. She also started wearing glasses in second grade for nearsightedness. At any rate, the frustration we both feel about this issue is definitely contributing to the problem. She spends so much mental energy panicking that she has very little left for paying attention to what she's doing. She's a very good reader, so I just don't understand why she would skip reading a whole sentence of a three-sentence problem -- and then skip it again when she's "checking" her work. (She definitely understands how to solve the problem when she actually makes herself read every word.) A good checklist might be a very useful tool.

You have nailed her, Tsuga! She is getting a lot more detail-oriented as she gets older, but I think residual anxiety is getting in her way in math. (We also need to address sleep issues, which I think will improve her focus) I will take a look at Saxon Math. I do think some sustained practice might be to her benefit, but I don't really know where to begin looking for resources. I appreciate the tip.

Thanks for your suggestions, Kuovonne! DD goes to public school, and they are using Houghton Mifflin's Go Math. We've tried a variety of other supplemental materials at home. I will definitely try asking her to read each question three times. She does sometimes struggle with word problems that are complex, but she is at least as apt to make silly mistakes with ones that are very easy for her. I definitely think it's more about focus than understanding or ability.

Hi. My daughter is in 5th grade. She generally does well in math, but her performance is inconsistent. I believe that her main issues are focus and engagement, as well as testing anxiety. She does not have trouble grasping skills when they are taught to her, but she isn't the sort who figures out new concepts (or extrapolates easily) on her own. She is also apt to forget skills without periodic review. We've found that a one-minute daily warm-up helps her a lot with both confidence and recall. However, careless errors have always been the most difficult problem to address. She used to make frequent arithmetic errors and would often miscopy a problem or answer, despite doing all of the math correctly. Now her issue is primarily with word problems. Rather than carefully reading what the problem asks for, she will guess what she THINKS the problem is likely to ask for -- and then solve that problem instead. We've found that asking her to underline key words usually helps, but sometimes she forgets to do this. She "checks" her work, but she must be mentally checked out when doing so. We've also noticed that she tends to consistently miss the last or second-to-last problem on tests. [These are no harder than the others generally.] In fact, I think she actually makes more errors on very easy problems than on difficult ones. Can anyone suggest ways to improve her resolve to read word problems carefully? I can't tell you how tired I am of hearing, "I THOUGHT it said..." She is a very good reader, so it is frustrating that her "math" issues are chiefly rooted in her unwillingness to carefully attend to the whole question. TIA for any help!