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corbie
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Has anyone used Math Mammoth as their spine for math? (Light Blue series) I'm considering it. It seems straight forward, short - to the point lessons, self explanatory, and inexpensive. I have MUS blocks and tons of other manipulatives to help. I'm looking at Light Blue 2b or 3a. I like the emphasis on mental math. Any opinions?

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I like relying on Math Mammoth. My kids, not so much.

 

OK, I like how comprehensive it is. And I'm just more of a workbook fan. I like the "checking it off" component.

 

My kids feel there is too much repetition and too many problems per page. And so they get cranky when they see it come out.

 

Today I had a reasonably good experience. Instead of letting them see the whole "book" which I had printed out, I gave them each 3 pages. I did the pages orally with my 7 year old, and only did about one-third of the problems. My 10 year old I told only to do one or two problems per section (about 3 or 4 sections per page) and he was surprised and pleased and did more than I asked. I also skipped ahead to sections that weren't repetitions of what they'd done recently.

 

It is hard with math, even though I enjoy working with them on it -- they like problems that aren't super easy, but also prefer not so hard that they need much instruction.

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Emily,

 

What levels are you using? I'm currently using Horions 2. I cross out a lot of problems per page. I think my dd needs to understand numbers better than Horizons is doing. Part of that is my fault. I hate the tm. It seems useless to me. DD hates flash cards, who doesn't? I don't think she is seeing the patterns in numbers, the tricks that make math easier. Do you feel that MM teaches that? I dont' think Horizons does.

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Well, we're coming off 1st and 4th grade materials. I think my kids are sort of ahead in terms of concepts, but aren't where they should be in terms of knowing math facts or even gaps in things they haven't covered. As I result, we were using MM.

 

That said, I haven't really relied on MM enough to know to answer your question, there's been such resistance. They've done pages from it over time, but way more of our math time is spent on a living math approach, so I think they get their conceptual understanding from that. See livingmath.net for more info. The associated email list on that site has people who use MM, and the author, so you might get some good replies there. If you're worried about concepts in early elementary, I really recommend reading to your all the living math books you can get your hands on, and playing games. What I like about MM is that it covers how to do problems on paper, and covers the breadth of topics more comprehensively than our reading had done.

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My daughter was very bored with Saxon 1, so we switched to MM 2a. So far it's a big hit. I print out each section at a time, staple the 2 to 3 pages together, and decide how much I want done in each sitting. For now we might just do a single problem a day or maybe just 1 page. (Some "problems" are actually more like 15 or 20.) That way she can just concentrate on one problem type before moving on the next day to the next one. It's such a different concept than Saxon, and she's very young, so we're taking it slow. She really seems to like it, though. I have not had any problems with her not wanting to do it, like I did with Saxon.

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I'm using MM along with Singapore and Miquon for dd. We just started subtraction and dd was having some trouble grasping it. Normally we do Miquon first, then SM and then MM to cement facts, but this time dd was getting frustrated with SM and Miquon doesn't do much with just subtraction of numbers up to 10 so MM came out early. Wow! The exercises seemed very repetititve, but repition was what dd needed to have subtraction click. We're moving along without frustration again.

 

We do no more than 2 pages a day and if they are dense we stick to 1 because there are a lot of problems on a page. You can also cut the pages in half and do 2 sessions to lighten the visual onslaught a bit. I love MM's approach, in fact, I think I like it better than SM, but dd would not be pleased if I ditched the cartoons.

 

I use the Blue series, because it contains the same material as the Lt. Blue and is much cheaper. If you spend a half hour going through the toc for Lt. Blue, you can piece it together from the Blue with no gaps. I did this for 1A to 2B very easily. You can buy the Blue 1-3 bundle for about $30 when it's on sale at Currclick and have 3 years of math. I'm very impressed with MM's quality. It just looks like more math worksheets, but they're really very well though out and do engender a deeper understanding of number relationships. It's also very good at cementing math facts with the exercises and games (they're in the appendix). My only caveat is that MM might be overwhelming for a kid who struggles in math. I tried it with ds and ended up dropping it and going with MUS and BJU because it stressed him out too much. But, I think he's a pretty extreme case ;).

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We just started with 1b for my 6.5 yo daughter. She is actually ahead of the material for the most part, but I wanted to introduce it to her at a level of review to see how she likes it, and to get familiar with the presentation style before moving into more challenging concepts. (She really enjoys workbook-y Math, so this is fun for her!) I've been impressed with the layout and scope, and she seems to really enjoy it. Plus it's been super easy for her to work through without much involvement from me. We don't assign a specific amount of work, so she goes at her own pace. The other day she sat down and did about 8 pages!

 

I would also second the Living Math approach. My daughter has progressed to a second grade Math level, and has a great concept of numbers, from this style of learning. Lots of games, discussion, books.

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I'm not sure if I would go with Blue as my spine. With the way chiguirre is doing it, along with two other programs, it is probably perfect, but if you're wanting it to be your main math program, I would probably look at Light Blue like you are doing. You could always email the author to get her opinion, though. I just think that the Blue series might not cover things as thoroughly, since it's specifically written to provide extra help on topics that students might struggle with.

 

Just my opinion, though.

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I was going to buy Lt. Blue, but I stumbled on the Blue samples and compared them to Lt. Blue. They were the same worksheets, and I do mean exactly the same.

 

Here are the links:

 

http://www.mathmammoth.com/preview/Math_Mammoth_Grade1A_Samples.pdf

 

http://www.mathmammoth.com/addition_1.php (you'll have to open each topic separately)

 

If you work through the tables of contents side by side, they line up exactly (with the exception of a couple of pages of review at the beginning of 2A, IIRC, I did this about 6 months ago). They spend the same number of pages on each topic title, so I doubt there is any difference in content. Given the similarities between the samples and the tocs, I feel very confident in using Blue and lining it up with the Lt. Blue topics. And the price difference is substantial, for a very little bit of time spent lining up topics with a toc.

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Guest 4boys

We got fed up with Horizons 1 this past April so we began MM 2A. I don't have a lot of experience yet but I will say that Bailey has a much better attitude about math!! I print out one unit at a time and he only does a page or two at a time. It is much less stressful than trying to get through four pages of Horizons just so we'd finish the book by the end of the year and he is understanding things now that he hadn't before. It is a hit here so far but like I said, we've only been using it for a couple of months.

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Julianna, What exactly did you have to do to group Blue as a complete curriculum? I think you are right that they are the same. Maria even says that somewhere. The only difference in something like measurement in 4th grade isn't in the blue. Anyway, I just wasn't sure if I'd be missing something by going with blue and didn't want a confusing mess. I guess I want to be sure it is easy to access and I know what to do next. If I can do that with blue for less $, why not? Also, I had both my girls take the placement test. Neither one passed their grade! A lot of it was silly mistakes, but a couple of things they really didn't know. Should I start them half a grade back? (do 2b for my 3rd grader and 4b for my 5th grader) Also, do you think 1a could be started in K?

 

Thanks for the help! I have a math curriculum cemetary on my book shelf! I really don't want to invest in another pricey set of books my kids hate. Also, I really like Maria's attitude. She seems to genuinely care about kids getting it with math. Her videos on you tube make it almost like MUS, which I also have. Anyway, I am cautiously optimistic.

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Just found this from MM free sample/e-mail.

 

Is the Blue series a complete curriculum?

It is complete in its coverage of topics for grades 1-3. For 4th grade it is lacking measurement lessons. I will be writing more material to it to make it complete for 5th and 6th eventually.

However, keep in mind several of the books in the Blue Series cover material for several grade levels in one book: it is NOT organized exactly by grade levels.

It is not complete in the sense that it does not contain tests or separate teacher helps or any other "add-ons".

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Just found this from MM free sample/e-mail.

 

Is the Blue series a complete curriculum?

It is complete in its coverage of topics for grades 1-3. For 4th grade it is lacking measurement lessons. I will be writing more material to it to make it complete for 5th and 6th eventually.

However, keep in mind several of the books in the Blue Series cover material for several grade levels in one book: it is NOT organized exactly by grade levels.

It is not complete in the sense that it does not contain tests or separate teacher helps or any other "add-ons".

 

 

OK, thanks for posting that. I wonder now why I was under the impression that it did not have as much practice in it. I'm almost positive I would have run across that in my weeks of agonizing over a decision between that and MUS for my oldest. :D I probably would have still ordered the Light Blue anyway. I like things to be in order as much as possible and having to completely reorganize the Blue series to be in the proper order would have driven me crazy. Especially since I only like to print what I need at a certain time and not all at once.

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Mommy2 BeautifulGirls - I hear you on the agonizing! I've already used MUS and Horizons. My older dd (10) is so easy with math. We only switched her from MUS to K12 math becuause there was just not enough review and she forgot how to do basic functions. I also got lost with Mr D's different way of doing things like division. Anyway, it was a great base, and she's doing great at K12 math.

 

I may go with light blue too. The last line says the blue does not offer teacher helps and add-ons. I need all the help I can get! I also only want to try one level to see if we like it. Really, it's all reasonably priced, expecially when you think about re-using it. I also agree with your point about printing as needed. I'm sure that is what I would do. I spend a fortune on printer ink. Light Blue would keep it organized for the next two dd's in line.

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Julianna, What exactly did you have to do to group Blue as a complete curriculum? I think you are right that they are the same. Maria even says that somewhere. The only difference in something like measurement in 4th grade isn't in the blue. Anyway, I just wasn't sure if I'd be missing something by going with blue and didn't want a confusing mess. I guess I want to be sure it is easy to access and I know what to do next. If I can do that with blue for less $, why not? Also, I had both my girls take the placement test. Neither one passed their grade! A lot of it was silly mistakes, but a couple of things they really didn't know. Should I start them half a grade back? (do 2b for my 3rd grader and 4b for my 5th grader) Also, do you think 1a could be started in K?

 

 

Corbie, I printed out the toc for Lt. Blue and had the Blue toc on the screen and read through the topics and checked them if they were there. The only extra is the occasional review page or section at the beginning or end of a unit. Blue and Lt. Blue go in the same order, with Blue having a few extra topics in a couple of workbooks. I only went through 3B because I have kids working at a 1st grade level, but they lined up pretty easily although a couple have slightly different names. For clocks, measurement and geometry, there were only a few topics in 1st grade and a few more in second. I do think that would be harder to do this for 4th and up because there are Green and Gold series as well as Blue and there might be topics missing in Blue. There's also no bundle for grades 4-6 so I'm not sure you'd save as much. It's not really that much more to buy Lt. Blue if you will stress about lining things up. But, up until 4th grade, Blue is complete and lines up very easily.

 

I wouldn't worry about your kids placing lower than grade level. MM seems to be pretty advanced compared to most curricula. It doesn't have the long review of previous years that most textbooks have. In fact, I wouldn't take a long break from MM because I'm pretty sure we'd have to back up and redo topics. MM lines up with SM and that's really a bit ahead of typical American math programs.

 

I wouldn't use 1a for K unless you have a very mathy child. MM assumes that you'll memorize the math facts in Addition and Subtraction 1. That's just too much for a lot (most?) K kids. The pages are very dense and could easily overwhelm a younger child. I actually cut up the pages if they are too dense so that dd only sees a section at a time. The games are a good way to have fun with math and there's a nice list of websites for practice too. These might work with a younger child, but only once they've developed number sense. If they still have to count everything, they'll be too laborious to be fun.

 

I have to go look for the youtube videos! I didn't know about those and I'm psyched to see them. Thanks for the tip!

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After hearing so much about this, I wanted to check out Math Mammoth. On looking at the Light Blue Series and seeing how many lessons are in each book, I am shocked! It would take more than a school year to go through each book, so it seems like kids would always be behind. I am considering this for my now 4 year old daughter as an option so I have plenty of time to find out. Can you do more than one lesson per day?

 

Jennifer

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I had never really considered that before because my 5-year-old, would-be PS rising Kindergartner is doing 2nd-grade MM. If she wants to take a few days to cover 2 pages of material, that's fine with me! I'm not going to rush her! :D

 

I want to say that somewhere on the MM site it states how long each "lesson" should take if you're doing a book each year. Anyone remember where I saw that? If not, I'll try to look it up later when I'm done cleaning the school room. (I'm "multitasking!") :001_huh:

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After hearing so much about this, I wanted to check out Math Mammoth. On looking at the Light Blue Series and seeing how many lessons are in each book, I am shocked! It would take more than a school year to go through each book, so it seems like kids would always be behind. I am considering this for my now 4 year old daughter as an option so I have plenty of time to find out. Can you do more than one lesson per day?

 

Jennifer

 

I checked the page count for 1A and 1B. 1A has 110 and 1B has 106 if you don't count the introductions which are addressed to the teacher. You'd only need to do more than 1 sheet 36 days and that's very doable because some pages are relatively light because the drawings are big or explanations take up some of the page. Dd can usually do 2 pages unless a sheet is very dense and those are usually review pages, so you might do some orally or even skip a few exercises. It's not hard to keep up with this pace, even adding in other programs.

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We've been doing MM for 2 years now. I love it. My 4th grader has done really well with it too. He really does well with the mental math and transferring simple concepts to bigger ones. I think it is like Singapore with more problems (which my son needed). We do skip through some of the problems, but he has learned so much that I really hate to skip through much!

 

We do 1-2 pages per day. The only thing I supplemented was multiplication drill.

 

My younger did Singapore with Horizons this year and I've decided to switch him to MM next year too. I think the MM first grade program is a bit dry, but I think he will be ready for the second grade program.

 

I bought the full year curriculums through Winterpromise. Don't forget about the test pages you can print out too!

 

Wendy

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We are using the Light Blue series 2B with my 3rd & 5th graders. 2A with my 2nd grader. All my children enjoy this program (we just started 3wks ago) They are doing about 3-4pgs a day. Some parts are easy so we skip it or I cross out some of the problems.

I plan to continue to use MM with my two older. My 3rd dc I might have continue with CLE because I already purchased this.

 

Math Mammoth looks like a keeper here. I was using Singapore with my dd but I was having trouble teaching it and my dd was getting frustrated with it. I like how MM explains better. It shows step by step. Singapore we would get confused :glare:

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OK, here's what I did - I bought 2b light blue for my almost 3rd grader and green measurement for my almost 5th grader. I also got their first "real life" workbook. I printed off the sample, and my kids from 4 to 10 were all involved in counting and averaging. That convinced me. So far, I'm really happy with it. The kids seem to like it. I'll keep you that are intersted posted.

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So far, so good. No whining about math. Lessons are short and effective. I do think I am going to bite the bullet and buy Right Start Math Games Kit for drill and setting the facts in their minds. I might do a little MEP with my youngest until she is ready for MM. Thanks for everyone's input. It's been very valuable!

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