leaving the lovely Singapore math - need help

[Caribbean Queen]

The Home Instructors Guides make my eyes glaze over. That is my one and only problem with Singapore Math. I have been making up my own lessons since 1A and now it's getting tough. I am ready to switch to another program which is self teaching or has better teacher's manuals. What can I use after we finish 4B until we get to Jacob's algebra?

 

Teaching Textbooks is too expensive for me.

 

Saxon and CLE have way too many problems and I have gotten the impression it is not advisable to skip problems.

 

The samples of Rod and Staff math for the upper grades looks depressingly boring. Sorry. (I like their history and will order their science, though!)

 

I own a MCP Math teacher's Manuel for 6th grade. I could get the workbook cheaply and teach it easily. Is it good enough? Would we need something else before Jacob's?

 

Would Developmental Math work?

I don't want to print worksheets. Does Math Mammoth come in workbooks? Would it be easy to skip problems? We don't need much repetition and drill.

[wapiti]

MM would seem to be the obvious answer for this situation. The instruction is much like Singapore (Asian-style, mastery) but it's an all-in-one worktext (workbook and textbook together) with no teacher manual. Lots of word problems. Inexpensive.

 

It's easy to skip problems. Indeed, the author recommends that on pages with lots of problems, you only assign some fraction of them.

 

The pages are a little more crowded than Singapore. The instruction is a little more incremental (smaller bites).

 

Placement gets a little wonky where you're at. Look at the TOCs and placement tests and skip whatever you need to.

 

If you don't want to print, you can buy it printed and bound.

[NittanyJen]

Yes, you can purchase Math Mammoth as workbooks at lulu.com or from Rainbow Resources. And yes, you can skip problems when needed if a concept has been acquired. When I used it for a bit, I found it was flexible; you could cover one idea in a day, or just assign the front and back of one page in a day.

[sagira]

I love using Math Mammoth. Here is the link for the Rainbow Resource MM 5 workbooks:

 

http://www.rainbowresource.com/product/Math+Mammoth+Light+Blue+Series+Grade+5+Set/MMSET5/f4a0d7de91d6ed4c051a3212?subject=10&category=9820

[Crimson Wife]

I agree with the suggestions of Math Mammoth.

 

However, if you really like Singapore but not the HIG's you could try taking yourself through the Parker & Baldridge Elementary Mathematics for Teachers book to see if that gives you enough of a background to be able to teach without the HIG's.

[boscopup]

I'll ditto the Math Mammoth recommendation. The two are very similar, so it's easy to switch from one to the other. Just assign the number of problems you think your child needs. There are way more available than Singapore, but it's fine to CUT THEM OUT. :D We usually did half the problems in MM, and that made it more like the amount Singapore has.

[blondeviolin]

I wonder if you've checked out other editions of Singapore. The Standards edition is pretty well laid out.

[Hunter]

Have you seen Study Time Math. I've been taking another look at it.

 

I have the full grade 3 and just the student workbook for grade 5. Without seeing the Schoolaid 1 and 2 and the grade 4 workbook, I think I might have misjudged it. I know the Climbing to Good English series needs to be viewed in it's entirety to see how good it is. There isn't a lot of repeating of material that was expected to be mastered already. The workbooks are completely open and go written to the student, in daily lessons.

 

Teachers are expected to work through the Amish curricula themselves, and they do teach, but there are accommodations for the teaching. For the math, the student starts math without teaching, but teaching takes place later on in the day. Difficult lessons are pre-taught in the days before. The upper grade English is set up so the teacher can teach 2 grades at the same time.

[Caribbean Queen]

Okay, I am seriously looking at MM.

 

Study Time Math is cute. It reminds me of MCP Math.

[warneral]

Math mammoth teaches strong mental math skills and I love that it is all in the one worktext

[serinat]

We switched from Singapore to Math Mammoth for exactly this reason. I am very happy with it. We will likely be using CWP, though.

[PhotoGal]

Have you considered just using the Singapore textbook/workbook without the HIG? I know some people insist you need it, but as long as you do some hands-on things every once in awhile and review mental math, I think you could do Singapore without the HIG. I like the HIG sometimes, but other times I feel like it is making us plod slowly through when we could just move along. :001_smile:

[kiwik]

You are supposed to be able to fill in the pdf workbooks on the computer so if your child likes the computer you could buy the pdf and not print it out. I am going to try this in a couple of weeks.

[specialkmom]

Are you using the US edition of Singapore Math? I use the standards edition, it's laid out much better. I've had several friends look at my Standards HIG and say how much better it is than the US edition.

 

I'd check out the Standards Edition before switching programs.

[jennyradmer]

We started with Singapore math and loved it. Well, I loved it. As a math tutor I thought it was brilliant. However my daughter is not a math tutor and she hated it and started feeling like she was terrible in math. We have switched to Math Mammoth and love it. This time we both love it (different child this time). It has the strengths of mental math that I loved about Singapore. We skip problems all the time when she understands a concept.