Do you allow your child to work in Saxon 5/4 book?

[CarolynD]

Today was our first day of school. My plan was for DD to rewrite her math work on separate paper. She did her work in the book today and now I'm thinking it might be worth it to let her continue on this way. I realize I will need to buy a new book for the next child but it might be worth it time wise since she is very particular about her writing. It might take days!:)

My question is: Do you all allow your children to write in the Saxon books?

 

Thanks,

Carolyn

[tillie]

My ds does not write in his books. Two reasons: 1) Space is limited in the book and doesn't provide adequate room to organize responses; and 2) I have a dd who will be using the materials in the near future and do not want to buy another set.

 

I love workbooks and have always allowed the children to write and color and draw in any workbooks. Textbooks are another story. No matter what the subject their work goes on notebook paper.

 

My ds is in Saxon 6/5 at age 9.5. When we first tranisitioned to Saxon after finishing Horizons 3, I would copy down the equations for him to ease the tranisition from workbooks to notebooks. After a couple of weeks, he naturally started writing the equations on his own.

 

Now I just need to figure out how to speed him up.

 

Good luck with the school year.

[Brindee]

My ds does not write in his books. Two reasons: 1) Space is limited in the book and doesn't provide adequate room to organize responses; and 2) I have a dd who will be using the materials in the near future and do not want to buy another set.

 

I love workbooks and have always allowed the children to write and color and draw in any workbooks. Textbooks are another story. No matter what the subject their work goes on notebook paper.

 

My ds is in Saxon 6/5 at age 9.5. When we first tranisitioned to Saxon after finishing Horizons 3, I would copy down the equations for him to ease the tranisition from workbooks to notebooks. After a couple of weeks, he naturally started writing the equations on his own.

 

Now I just need to figure out how to speed him up.

 

Good luck with the school year.

I agree--write in workbooks, not in textbooks. We have other kids who use the textbooks--either a sibling or we give or sell it to others. We couldn't afford to buy a new book for every child, so that's just how we worked it.

 

Tillie, sounds like your ds is right on track for his age, that's good. I'm sure he'll speed up some as he gets older! :001_smile:

[LinRTX]

:sad:No, they need to learn to organize their work and their is not enough room to do this in the book. The first few lessons there is enough, but by the end of the book it would definitely need to be on paper.

 

I also needed to use the book for 3 more. Even my last did hers on paper.

 

Linda (who just realized her last child has already used Saxon 5/4 for the last time:sad:)

[kckamy]

No, I don't let my daughter write in the Saxon textbook or any other textbook. Mostly because I want to resell my books but also because there isn't enough room.

 

We made copies of the recording forms found in the back of the Tests and Worksheets book (one for the lesson, one for mixed practice, and one for tests); these worked out great. The grids help keep the student's work neat and it is also easy to check the answers since the problem numbers and the dividing lines are in bold.

 

Amy

[MamaT]

:sad:No, they need to learn to organize their work and their is not enough room to do this in the book. The first few lessons there is enough, but by the end of the book it would definitely need to be on paper.

 

I also needed to use the book for 3 more. Even my last did hers on paper.

 

Linda (who just realized her last child has already used Saxon 5/4 for the last time:sad:)

 

:iagree: None of mine wrote in the book for these very same reasons (6 kids have gone through my Saxon 5/4 at this point). I realized when I read this that my last child used Saxon 5/4 last year.

[Mom0012]

I'm not using Saxon, but I let my son write in his R&S textbook. It is taking him quite some time to finish each lesson this year and I'm sure it would add at least another 20 - 30 minutes if he had to write it all out. One hour a day on math is enough.

 

Lisa

[Ellie]

Nope.

 

Previous generations (i.e., you and I) managed to write our math assignments on actual paper. I don't understand why *our* dc are unable to do that??

[freeindeed]

My dd just started 5/4 today & she's not writing in the textbook. To ease this transition, I took her shopping for a new math notebook last week. I really played it up and let her choose what she wanted...it was a Camp Rock notebook.:tongue_smilie: Then today I wrote some samples to show her exactly how to use her notebook, and she loved it! She felt really grown up, and she told me how much fun math was. Who knew?:lol:

[MamaT]

When my dc first starting writing out their math problems, I bought them graph paper to use. One number for one block. It helped them keep their problems lined up correctly.

[CarolynD]

Thanks everyone for your responses! I admit, I was having a weak moment! We did Math AFTER Vocabulary. While doing Vocabulary in Wordly Wise, told me she was going to recopy all of her vocab. words so she didn't have to flip back an extra page to find the answers. That would have taken forever. She's a smart girl but time management and speed is not one of her strong suits.

 

We have gone over her assignments tomorrow and I gently explained she would need to write out the problems tomorrow. I think she is also trying to see what she can get away with. After all, this is all new territory for her.

 

 

Thanks again-

Carolyn

[Susu]

I agree with the previous responses. My son tends to "cramp up" his responses...crowding all the answers in the top 1/4 of the page and leaving the rest of the notebook paper pristine white and unadulterated! He doesn't like to show his work, preferring to do the work in his head and jotting down his answer. He often doesn't even do the long division and multiplication on paper...which makes for several mistakes of course. I must admit though that he does a remarkable job in his mental math...much better than I would do if I tried to do long calculations in my head!

 

At any rate, I sat down with him today to go over his mistakes and had him write out the missed examples, explaining that he shouldn't be "allergic" to using room on his paper, and that he needed to show me the steps he took to get his answer. At some point in high school or college he is going to need the skill of organizing his work, copying problems, and neatly putting it all on paper. I won't do him any favors by continuing to coddle him by always using workbooks, or making copies etc. (Though I have done that many a time in the past!) For the first time today he seemed to "get" why he needed to show the steps on paper since he could clearly see how easy it was to make a mistake in mental math when doing multi-step problems.

 

I say all that to say that at this point I am transitioning to him doing more and more of his own work on blank sheets of paper. He is now in 6th grade (doing Saxon 7/6). We also use Rod and Staff, so he has another subject that requires copying from a text book. It has taken him a couple of years though to really get developmentally ready to do this much writing. I think it is fine to make sure that your child is not trying to do too much...you know what he is capable of, and where it might be appropriate to help him in transcribing some of his work.

 

I still do a good deal of copying or transcribing for my third grade daughter when she is faced with a large degree of written work...though I am doing less now than I did last year, and I will consciously reduce my help as the year progresses. I think you have to look at it as a work in progress!

 

Susu

[Phoatogirl]

My boys use a spiral notebook for their math problems. Before writing anything other than the lesson number (at the top), they draw a vertical line straight down the page, then two horizontal lines in such a way as to divide the lined part of the paper into 6 squares. They are not always even, but at least there are 6 divisions for 6 problems. We go through spirals more quickly this way than if they were spacing them on their own as they went, but at least the work is not cramped. Having them divide the page on their own keeps me from having to photocopy a graph paper sheet. (I suppose I could go through the spiral and draw the lines for them, though).

[sahm99]

...I think I might...

Ds is going to start 5/4 in September, and while I see the value of learning to write out his problems, I think we loose nothing waiting another year or two..

I looked through the book and it seems like he will have enough space to work the huge majority of problems in there...

We do have smaller siblings following, but frankly, I am ready to re-invest in new books, if that helps ds to keep enjoying math...more or less;)...

[Melissa in Australia]

I write the problems out for my ds doing 67. he has dyslexia, and if he writes the problems out, it is just a jumble of letters and imposable to work out. I also write the math out for dd9. she is doing 67 as well.the older 2 just write the question number, and the answers. they don't write the problem at all

[JudoMom]

Thanks everyone for your responses! I admit, I was having a weak moment! We did Math AFTER Vocabulary. While doing Vocabulary in Wordly Wise, told me she was going to recopy all of her vocab. words so she didn't have to flip back an extra page to find the answers. That would have taken forever. She's a smart girl but time management and speed is not one of her strong suits.

 

We have gone over her assignments tomorrow and I gently explained she would need to write out the problems tomorrow. I think she is also trying to see what she can get away with. After all, this is all new territory for her.

 

 

Thanks again-

Carolyn

 

I would second the graph paper. It helps keep the numbers lined up and the papers neat-looking.

[kckamy]

No, I don't let my daughter write in the Saxon textbook or any other textbook. Mostly because I want to resell my books but also because there isn't enough room.

 

We made copies of the recording forms found in the back of the Tests and Worksheets book (one for the lesson, one for mixed practice, and one for tests); these worked out great. The grids help keep the student's work neat and it is also easy to check the answers since the problem numbers and the dividing lines are in bold.

 

Amy

 

I responded to this post yesterday and no one else has mentioned the recording forms in the back of the Saxon Tests and Worksheets book. I want to make sure everyone using Saxon (5/4 and up) knows about these forms - they are great and much easier than using your own paper or your own graph paper.

 

Also, Wordly Wise was mentioned in one post. Over the summer I type up the vocabulary words from each lesson; this eliminates some of the flipping back and forth. I only type the words so if definitions are needed then my daughter will flip back in the book. After I print the word lists, (I get 4 lessons on a 8 1/2" x 11" page) I cut the page into 4 sections this way each word list is small and manageable.

 

I hope this helps.

 

Amy

[EKS]

I used the response sheet in the back of the book. Actually, I made my own on the computer but it looked just like it. I then copied out the problems in ink myself. I didn't copy things like word problems though.

 

My son has some LDs that make copying problems very difficult. I know that the difference in the amount of time it took him to do a problem set was amazing if I didn't copy the problems. It took 2-3 times longer if I made him do the copying himself.

[Phoatogirl]

I

Also, Wordly Wise was mentioned in one post. Over the summer I type up the vocabulary words from each lesson; this eliminates some of the flipping back and forth. I only type the words so if definitions are needed then my daughter will flip back in the book. After I print the word lists, (I get 4 lessons on a 8 1/2" x 11" page) I cut the page into 4 sections this way each word list is small and manageable.

 

I hope this helps.

 

Amy

 

 

The newest edition of Wordly Wise has the word list on every page.

[Mandy in TN]

hmm. Just a different perspective-

 

Not only do I allow my children to write in their textbooks, I encourage them to and I do it too.:) Highlighters are always on my school supply list.

 

When oldest ds began CC last fall, I think that it was useful that he knew how to skim and highlight in his texts.

 

As to Saxon specifically, I write notes directly in the book, but there really isn't enough room to work out all the problems there. We have used graph paper and I have copied problems, but eventually the older two did figure it out and I suppose the little one will too.

 

HTH-

Mandy