Skipping problems with Saxon, hope my learned lesson helps someone.

[swimmermom3]

OK. I'll be another contrarian.

 

If you don't deeply teach the "whys" of mathematics you can have a student solve equations until they are blue-in-the-face, and at best you will get a student who can competently apply the standard algorithms. At worst they hate math with a passion and feel like math dummies.

 

Far better to spend the years of "math time" building a foundation for understanding mathematical reasoning, the laws of mathematics, and understanding "why" a math algorithm works , because if a student understands that they don't need to repeat the same thing a thousand times.

 

And if they don't understand these things, they will never "get it" whether they do equations once, or a thousand times. They may lean how to plug-in the numbers to get the right answer when provided the algorithm, but that's a pretty low goal to strive for IMO.

 

Bill (who is sure this will be a popular post :lol:)

 

Bill, this was hotly debated over on the high school forum, I believe. I would very much like to teach deeply the "whys" of mathematics to my son. However, I would need to learn those myself first. Therein lies some of the problem. Many of you would say and have said, "Then you shouldn't be teaching him." Agreed, but the alternative (public and private schools) is what we have had to work to repair with our older children.

 

What I can offer my son as a teacher is consistency. We do math 5 days a week (4 days Saxon, 1 day games, problemoids, finances). We go over each incorrect problem and I require extra problems to make up for careless mistakes. When I don't know the "why", I go in search of the answer. But then I approach all of our subjects this way. My kids know I don't have all the answers but will seldom rest until I do. I will never be as good as a gifted math teacher and am probably doing my son a disservice. The guilt would explain my continuous presence on math threads.:tongue_smilie:

 

If it is taking him too long, move back a level, until he can do the work quickly. Let him get his speed and confidence up with easier problems, and then when he gets back on the level you are now, he will do the problems quickly and with confidence.

 

This is my daughter's experience with Saxon at the charter school. In 5th grade (Saxon 65) she was behind. She wasn't understanding the concepts, she wasn't solid on her facts, and it took her FOR EV ER to get through a problem set. She has some dyslexic and ADD issues (but no official diagnosis). She was failing.

 

I took her out and started homeschooling math. We went way back, back to borrowing. We drilled math facts, one group at a time until she knew them solidly. I took her out of Saxon and put her in Rod and Staff so she could focus on one area at a time, but still have plenty of review.

 

This year she is back in Saxon 65 at the charter school, and it's a huge difference. She's one of the strongest students in the class. She consistently gets the problem set done during class time. It's amazing. She's getting A's on her tests.

 

She still makes lots of errors. For some reason the class doesn't go over the homework or make them correct errors, so I grade the homework set every night and reteach anything that she didn't learn right the first time. If I can see a tricky new concept coming up, I try to preteach it, so she understands even if she is spacey at the wrong time. We are also going through Kumon workbooks at home to teach speed and accuracy in the basic algorithms.

 

If Saxon lessons (including everything) is taking more than an hour or so, it's because they are placed too high. Move them back, make them do everything, and they will get the skills they need to do the higher level stuff more quickly. And they will gain more confidence and might even start to kind of like math, if they are anything like my daughter.

 

Sara, my ds does everything s-l-o-w-l-y except swim. He finished 7/6 with ease last year and made few careless mistakes. Just recently the math time has been extended out ever farther and my typically focused child is all over the place. This happened to his siblings too in 6th grade. However, I do think he would benefit from more review so will go to doing all of the problems. In order to get him to move along, I'll probably give him an hour and then assign the rest as homework. He is protective of his limited free time and should be inspired to pick up the pace. We are going back to flashcards as well. He was a victim of the "grouping" method and it's been a hard method to get rid of.

 

Bill, you are probably thinking, "How could she?" I know. I just don't know what else to do.

Edited January 23, 2010 by swimmermom3
Addition

[Nicole M]

You people are making my head hurt. I was just reading about Peter the Great and found this little gem from one of his bishops. "Abhorred of God is any who loves geometry; it is a spiritual sin." After reading this thread, I wonder if the bish isn't on to something. :D

[swimmermom3]

You people are making my head hurt. I was just reading about Peter the Great and found this little gem from one of his bishops. "Abhorred of God is any who loves geometry; it is a spiritual sin." After reading this thread, I wonder if the bish isn't on to something. :D

 

Back you wicked woman, I am having a self-flagellating moment here...but I do like the quote.:D

[Spy Car]

The guilt would explain my continuous presence on math threads.:tongue_smilie:

 

No guilt.

 

We're all doing the best we can for our kids, we'll all come up short in our own estimations somewhere. Math was where I had a Scarlet O'Hara moment and said "As God as my witness..." I'm going to make sure my son has a better (and deeper and more fun) math education than I did.

 

I may have gone over-board :lol:

 

Bill

[swimmermom3]

No guilt.

 

We're all doing the best we can for our kids, we'll all come up short in our own estimations somewhere. Math was where I had a Scarlet O'Hara moment and said "As God as my witness..." I'm going to make sure my son has a better (and deeper and more fun) math education than I did.

 

I may have gone over-board :lol:

 

Bill

 

Now we are getting somewhere. Bill, are you a math guy or have you taught yourself to be a math guy? If so, how? Obviously, you are not yet struggling to do Algebra II alongside your son, yet.

 

No, I would never think you were overboard when it came to math. Never.:D

[Spy Car]

Now we are getting somewhere. Bill, are you a math guy or have you taught yourself to be a math guy? If so, how? Obviously, you are not yet struggling to do Algebra II alongside your son, yet.

 

No, I would never think you were overboard when it came to math. Never.:D

 

5 years ago I would have said NOT a "math guy". My "worst" subject in school (boring!). Now I'm starting to really love (early elementary) math. :D

 

I've gotten excited figuring out what I want to teach, and how best to teach it. I "steal" from the best and invent methods of my own. In the process, I'm getting a re-education.

 

But I'm not ready for Algebra II/Trig. No Ma'am. Not yet.

 

Bill

Edited January 24, 2010 by Spy Car

[msjones]

I'm not suggesting a child shouldn't have facility with number manipulation. We work on that all the time. But in an inter-related Singapore number bond style way. So 7 can be 5 and 2 (as well as other re-grouping) and that:

 

7 - 5 = 2, 7 - 2 = 5, 2 + 5 = 7, [ ] + 5 = 7, 2 + [ ] = 7 (one could go on).

 

The point remains, that no matter how much practice a child gets doing equations, or how fast their low-level cognition of "math facts" comes to them, if they don't understand the concepts of why algorithms "work" and the logic of mathematical reasoning they will never get to this understanding via memorization or by doing endless exercises.

 

They may get good at computing and not making operational errors, which are not unworthy goals, but I'd suggest you can get to that same place (and far beyond it) if "math time" is spend developing an understanding of mathematical reasoning starting from the very beginning of math exposure.

 

It's a longer slog to work though all the re-grouping in terms of tens and fives than it is to have the child simply "memorize" them. It takes more work to make sure they understand the base-10/place-value system of math we use from the outset. But it pays dividends.

 

And no amount of practice will remediate a lack of understanding of mathematic reasoning.

 

Bill

 

:iagree: Well said, Bill.

[lovinmykids]

Hmmmmm. Makes me think! I started out the year with Saxon 3 and WOW, it was so good for my 3rd grader. She learned how to skip count like no other, do calendar, money, etc. Things she could not grasp at all last year.

For some reason, I decided to go back to CLE. BUT, I still continued to and still do, use the meeting strip.

When we started back up with CLE, she had to go into Light unit 206 to start off.

Now, the only problem is that....

A. She hates working in those books cuz it's alot pages.

B. She's getting held up because she has mastered alot of the material.

But because some of the geom. stuff or other pittely things are new,

She can't work ahead in cle.

C. She has already been doing mult. and div. on the side.

D. Thinking I made a mistake????

 

It gets to be alot each day when your doing Saxon mtg. strip, CLE math and all my mult. flashcards.

 

I try to look ahead at which one would be easier for me in the long run to teach.

CLE is very easy and Saxon TM can be overwhelming.

 

Any suggestions???

Of course if we started back up with Saxon 3 (by the way, my Dd loved it, the only math she has loved) we would probely have to start at lesson 33 or so because of where we left off and she wouldn't know the material that comes quickly.

Is this a bad thing?

Math has always been a real struggle but this year she has just grown mathmatically.

IDEAS???

Thanks.

[Nicole M]

If it is taking him too long, move back a level, until he can do the work quickly. Let him get his speed and confidence up with easier problems, and then when he gets back on the level you are now, he will do the problems quickly and with confidence.

 

 

I really wish I'd done this with my older son. I would give this a try, Lisa. You could make it a challenge, maybe (would he go for this?), like trying to improve his swim time...?

[selh09]

Ok...Now my head hurts!!! We are starting saxon 1 in Feb. and my dd LOVED saxon k. As I've read on this forum, there are 2 opinions about saxon, you either love it or hate it. I'm wondering after reading MANY MANY threads should I supplement with SM so that she understands the "whys" of math, but stick with saxon for the drill, etc. We tried SM EB and she didn't like it. It was like pulling teeth to get her to do it. I'd pull out saxon and I had to stop her because we would do 3 lessons in one sitting. Any suggestions????

 

Bill I noticed that you are teaching elementary math....what are you using????

 

What is everyone else using?????

 

Thanks for the help!! :)

[HollyDay]

UGH!!!! My head hurts too!

Edited January 24, 2010 by HollyDay
does not follow this thread

[nmoira]

 

But you also have to practice the algorithms until they become automatic, so the brain has room to understand the why of the next concept. Our brains have limited working memory. We can only concentrate on a handful of new things at a time. But our long-term memory is limitless. The way things move from the working memory to the long-term memory is practice. Lots and lots of practice.

But you're making an assumption that all children need exactly the same amount of practice before automaticity is gained. Some children need more, which is why, after all, there are extra practice books and many here supplement heavily. Others need less. Also, given that most of the arithmetic skills and concepts learned are *used* as a child advances through K-6 math -- at least with the programs we've used -- there is a lot of build in reinforcement throughout the progression. It's soon apparent, or should be, whether or not mastery has been attained, and there's no shame in taking an occasional step back if it hasn't.

[swimmermom3]

I really wish I'd done this with my older son. I would give this a try, Lisa. You could make it a challenge, maybe (would he go for this?), like trying to improve his swim time...?

 

There is not a chance in the world I could get the boy to back up. We did every lesson in 7/6 last year and he scored 90-100% on testing. I suspect given his nature that if he has to do all of the problems, I will see a marked improvement. However, last year I did have his brother who was in 8th grade at the time, go back through 7/6 at double time in order to be ready for high school. We then finished Algebra 1/2 with ease. I do firmly believe in backing up if the situation warrants it. I'm just not sure that is the case here.

[momee]

Holly,

not sure if your reply is exasperation or a comment to those of us saying to do all Saxons problems.

 

Really, with a hug, my intention was not to condmen anyones use of Saxon. I'm just giving our experience of assuming knowledge, allowing skipping and later having trouble. Doing so allows me to share my personal experience and to help those moms who are less experienced to benefit from that. I loved those posts on here when I first started.

 

I think it would be the case with whatever math program you would use, really. If a child is having trouble completing the work in a normal amount of time, maybe they don't know what we think they know.

 

This thread was specifically about skipping Saxon problems.

 

Might I humbly suggest starting a new thread addressing your specific situation?

All this said in a very friendly way (which doesn't always sound so over the keypad).

 

A note:

I am selling my Lial's BCM and was looking at how it teaches fractions of decimals because that was the lesson I was looking at in Saxon. Lials also teaches by a visual what is 1/2 of a 1/2 when beginning to talk about multiplying fractions.

Edited January 24, 2010 by momee

[momee]

I also wanted to add one small thing regarding the recent replies.

 

This is the age - roughly 7/6 8/7 when their minds go kookooo!

Beware of that silent but deadly thing called puberty as a factor as well. That needs (and has) threads of it's own ;)

[HollyDay]

Hi Momee!!

 

You are exactly right. I was really frustrated when I wrote that. I am sorry for venting my math concerns here.

 

Saxon is a fine program and works very well for very many. My youngest is one.

[swimmermom3]

Holly,

not sure if your reply is exasperation or a comment to those of us saying to do all Saxons problems.

 

Really, with a hug, my intention was not to condmen anyones use of Saxon. I'm just giving our experience of assuming knowledge, allowing skipping and later having trouble. Doing so allows me to share my personal experience and to help those moms who are less experienced to benefit from that. I loved those posts on here when I first started.

 

I think it would be the case with whatever math program you would use, really. If a child is having trouble completing the work in a normal amount of time, maybe they don't know what we think they know.

 

This thread was specifically about skipping Saxon problems.

 

Might I humbly suffest starting a new thread addressing your specific situation?

All this said in a very friendly way (which doesn't always sound so over the keypad).

 

A note:

I am selling my Lial's BCM and was looking at how it teaches fractions of decimals because that was the lesson I was looking at in Saxon. Lials also teaches by a visual what is 1/2 of a 1/2 when beginning to talk about multiplying fractions.

 

I also wanted to add one small thing regarding the recent replies.

 

This is the age - roughly 7/6 8/7 when their minds go kookooo!

Beware of that silent but deadly thing called puberty as a factor as well. That needs (and has) threads of it's own ;)

 

I wanted to thank Momee for starting this thread. I , for one, don't feel condemned about only doing half the problems. She has a more than valid point which may not apply to every child but applies to many. In our household, it is definitely worth considering.

 

Ah puberty. I suspect that is one of the culprits. My very focused child, who has a plan for everything, complained last week of having a difficult time paying attention. Yes, I have been here before.:tongue_smilie: