8circles Posted March 12, 2012 Share Posted March 12, 2012 How do you use it? Do you need to supplement? Any comments or tips for someone just starting out? We've used MEP and Singapore, horizons, miquon. CSMP is just really catching my eye & I think my Ds2 will really like the format. Its so different though that im a bit nervous. Ease my fears, please. Will CSMP be enough as a stand-alone? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cmarango Posted March 12, 2012 Share Posted March 12, 2012 We started by doing a bit of the K material and now we are using the First Grade plans and I am alternating with RS. I would consider both to be our spines now. We love it thus far. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tracy Posted March 13, 2012 Share Posted March 13, 2012 I am using CSMP exclusively with my dd. We started with First Grade last year, and we are doing Second Grade now. I have absolutely no qualms about using this as a stand-alone program. My dd is almost 7yo, and she can add any whole numbers together, even with regrouping. She is starting multiplication and a little division and fractions. I see her doing a lot of work in her head, so the mental math emphasis seems to be working. She can take a word problem and think of different ways to approach it. She is getting increasingly better at estimation, another concept that is really emphasized in CSMP. And on top of it, she likes doing it (though she still doesn't like worksheets). Have you joined the CSMP Yahoo Group? There is a document in the files written by a parent that has gone through the whole program with each of two children, beginning to end. He did a tiny bit of supplementing for learning multiplication facts around 4th grade and a little with teaching the traditional division algorithm in 6th grade. It is worth reading. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
8circles Posted March 13, 2012 Author Share Posted March 13, 2012 I have joined the group but haven't looked around yet much. Ill look for that file. Thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nansk Posted March 13, 2012 Share Posted March 13, 2012 We are supplementing with CSMP. I pick and choose interesting lessons to do on weekends (negative numbers, set theory). We also do the second grade story books once in a while. My dd is a kinesthetic learner and loves moving the little glass beads we use for the minicomputers. I think, given a choice, she would choose CSMP over all other maths programs we do. If we were to do CSMP exclusively, I think I would teach her the traditional grouping/ungrouping algorithms as well. Also, I would supplement with lots of word problems. ETA: Yes, and I would make her memorize the times tables too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Riverland Posted March 13, 2012 Share Posted March 13, 2012 Ease my fears, please. Will CSMP be enough as a stand-alone? Sorry, I can't ease your fears. My dd was in full-time public school gifted for grades 1-5. This is the only math program they used and did not supplement. She started the gifted program being fantastic at math (from natural ability and home learning). By the time she hit middle school she was confused why she didn't know basic algorithms & times tables like the kids in the regular classes. Her confidence tanked. In high school, she hated math. Now in college, her math professor wonders how she comes up with some of the crazy logic for (wrongly) solving the problems. She still always scored very high on standardized tests including the SAT, but she does not have the computational skills and higher understanding needed for science and math fields. I would absolutely not use it as a stand alone. I have no qualms in saying that it ruined math for my daughter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
8circles Posted March 13, 2012 Author Share Posted March 13, 2012 Sorry, I can't ease your fears. My dd was in full-time public school gifted for grades 1-5. This is the only math program they used and did not supplement. She started the gifted program being fantastic at math (from natural ability and home learning). By the time she hit middle school she was confused why she didn't know basic algorithms & times tables like the kids in the regular classes. Her confidence tanked. In high school, she hated math. Now in college, her math professor wonders how she comes up with some of the crazy logic for (wrongly) solving the problems. She still always scored very high on standardized tests including the SAT, but she does not have the computational skills and higher understanding needed for science and math fields. I would absolutely not use it as a stand alone. I have no qualms in saying that it ruined math for my daughter. Yikes. Ok. Thanks for the honesty. Now to find out which program to supplement... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tracy Posted March 13, 2012 Share Posted March 13, 2012 Sorry, I can't ease your fears. My dd was in full-time public school gifted for grades 1-5. This is the only math program they used and did not supplement. She started the gifted program being fantastic at math (from natural ability and home learning). By the time she hit middle school she was confused why she didn't know basic algorithms & times tables like the kids in the regular classes. Her confidence tanked. In high school, she hated math. Now in college, her math professor wonders how she comes up with some of the crazy logic for (wrongly) solving the problems. She still always scored very high on standardized tests including the SAT, but she does not have the computational skills and higher understanding needed for science and math fields. I would absolutely not use it as a stand alone. I have no qualms in saying that it ruined math for my daughter. This has really made me think carefully about this curriculum. There is a weakness in teaching the traditional algorithms. You can be really good at math, but if you are unfamiliar with the traditional algorithms, you are going to struggle with higher math classes. We are a bit more than half way through the 2nd grade program, and we have only encountered the addition algorithm that most of us know as "carrying." CSMP does teach this traditional addition algorithm, but I find that it is not emphasized as much as I want. CSMP will take a single math problem and have the child do it several different ways, and it tends to emphasize using the mini-computer. While the mini-computer is great for teaching regrouping, it is not a very efficient way of doing calculations. So we may use the mini-computer for just one of these problems and then use only the traditional algorithm for the remaining problems. In first grade, I just showed her how to do it, but in second grade, I started having her do it herself. There is even an entire addition workbook that we used to practice. I have started doing the same thing with multiplication this year just showing her how to do it and then having her starte to do it on her own next year. I plan to handle the other algorithms in a similar way. (I understand that multiplication is taught the traditional way but that subtraction and multiplication are different.) I share this only to point out that you may not need to purchase another entire program to supplement these things. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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