Will this be enough math?

[UrbanSue]

Dh and I are really trying to work with our 8yo ds who is very, very obstinate and S-L-O-W with math. As far as we can tell, he is fairly bright but, for a combination of reasons (not all of which are his fault) he is fairly behind in math. He's at or above third grade level in all his other subjects but about 1/2 way into Singapore 2A right now.

 

My approach with math has been manipulatives, textbook, workbook, mental math. But we get to the workbook and he just shuts down. He sat before a three-page review section for five hours yesterday. Dh came home and I was at the end of my rope. Dh pulled out the level two CWP book (which we've never used since I don't want to add more to his math!) and sat with him. Ds did several problems as hard or harder than what he'd been doing for me and he did it all cheerfully and in his head. Argggh!

 

Ds does habitually grumble about his other subjects but does them more or less cheerfully. We used to have this same Five Hours for Three Pages problem with spelling when we were using Spelling Workout. We switched to WRTR and he loves it. I think he just really, really hates workbooks. I don't think he is able to see any point or benefit to filling in blanks.

 

So, I'm thinking of sticking with Singapore, teaching new concepts with manipulatives but then skipping all the textbook/workbook and going straight to CWP. We also have LOF which he likes quite a bit. We've been using it as a fun supplement on Fridays but we just started this summer so he's only on Cats. We could start doing LOF daily and not run out of stuff.

 

Will JUST CWP and LOF be enough math? Will we be missing something important? I think it's possible that ds is very, very good at math and our approach has killed it for him. Dh is a math genius and Ds's mind seems to work the same way but it's hard to meet him where he's at and figure out how to nurture his math skills. I'm having a lot of trouble sorting out when he's being obstinate and when he's just too bored to bother and when he legitimately doesn't understand something.

 

If anyone reading this thinks a completely different curriculum would serve him well, I'm all ears, though I'm not really anxious to switch from Singapore without a REALLY good reason.

 

Thanks!

[wapiti]

He's at or above third grade level in all his other subjects but about 1/2 way into Singapore 2A right now.

 

My approach with math has been manipulatives, textbook, workbook, mental math. But we get to the workbook and he just shuts down. He sat before a three-page review section for five hours yesterday. Dh came home and I was at the end of my rope. Dh pulled out the level two CWP book (which we've never used since I don't want to add more to his math!) and sat with him. Ds did several problems as hard or harder than what he'd been doing for me and he did it all cheerfully and in his head. Argggh!

It sounds like the placement, pace and/or level of challenge are wrong for him. I'd move him ahead as quickly as you can until he reaches a more appropriate level for him. You might compact lessons when possible or skip lessons that he already knows, allow him to test out of chapters, etc.

 

If CWP isn't quite enough for skipping the regular workbook (I don't know), consider adding the IP book.

 

You might also check out supplemental math resources often discussed on the Accelerated Learning board. If he likes a challenge, maybe Beast Academy would appeal to him.

[Chrysalis Academy]

I can't answer most of what you are asking, but I can say that it sounds like your son is an ideal candidate for LOF. LOF is fun, quirky, moves quickly but reviews constantly, and there is a *lot* of math in there. I would put more time into that, since he likes it, and just monitor as he goes along - you will see where he needs more practice (like maybe LOF Fractions - we found that the last 1/3 of that book moved too quickly, without enough practice, so wasn't enough on its own to learn fractions).

 

I haven't used Singapore, but we do use MM which is somewhat similar, and I can generate the same behaviors you are seeing in your son by moving too slowly and/or making her do every problem when she gets it. Luckily, she has gotten a lot better about verbalizing it - she will say "Mom, I get this, the problems are getting boring, can we move on?" instead of the foot-dragging and taking forever to finish a page. So yeah, it does sound like that might be part of the problem.

 

I can definitely sympathize. I have a bright dd who *hates* workbooks, and it took some trial and error to figure out both materials and teaching methods that work with her. When she is engaged, she is a delightful student to work with. When she is bored, she is . . . not.

[forty-two]

So, I'm thinking of sticking with Singapore, teaching new concepts with manipulatives but then skipping all the textbook/workbook and going straight to CWP. We also have LOF which he likes quite a bit. We've been using it as a fun supplement on Fridays but we just started this summer so he's only on Cats. We could start doing LOF daily and not run out of stuff.

 

Will JUST CWP and LOF be enough math? Will we be missing something important? I think it's possible that ds is very, very good at math and our approach has killed it for him. Dh is a math genius and Ds's mind seems to work the same way but it's hard to meet him where he's at and figure out how to nurture his math skills. I'm having a lot of trouble sorting out when he's being obstinate and when he's just too bored to bother and when he legitimately doesn't understand something.

 

A couple thoughts:

 

First, ITU the bolded - Dd6 is the same way. Fun, fun, eh? ;)

 

Second, if he can successfully use the technique you were trying to teach him to do CWP problems without help, then I'd say he doesn't need any more teaching or practice exercises - the point of those are to build understanding, and so if he *has* that understanding, enough to do CWP, then I'd say he's had all the math *teaching* he needs, even if it was a sum total of 5 minutes with manipulatives.

 

But he might benefit from working more *problems* - fluency can take time to build. I know that I understand math concepts easily, but it takes a lot of working with them before I really internalize them and can use them automatically. Now, I got by for a long time with rederiving everything I needed as I needed it, but eventually it just takes too much time, and you are too far behind everyone else, who learned all those intermediate skills to fluency. (STEM majors are unforgiving that way.)

 

Anyway, all that to say that in your shoes I'd add more thinking-type problems. Zaccaro's Primary Challenge Math is rec'd a lot, and you can pull problems from MEP or CSMP, both free online, and with tons of problems that have you use concepts in new and novel ways.

 

Also, I might try to require him to give his answer to the CWP problems in a full sentence, with units attached (which, if you look at the CWP worked examples, they do each time), if just orally. "Sally has 53 bunnies", not "53". Making sure you are answering the actual question is an important skill, and keeping units attached both is good practice for later and is a big help in keeping track of what you are doing. And it's exactly the sort of thing mathy kids like to skip as they race for the answer, and sooner or later it will bite them :doh.

[UrbanSue]

It sounds like the placement, pace and/or level of challenge are wrong for him. I'd move him ahead as quickly as you can until he reaches a more appropriate level for him. You might compact lessons when possible or skip lessons that he already knows, allow him to test out of chapters, etc.

 

 

I would LOVE to accelerate him and let him test out but when I give him a review lesson as a test he stares at if for five hours. So . . . what?

[Hunter]

My youngest was very math bright, but math lazy. It was just of a piece of my bigger problem with him. He and I had a real co-dependant passive-aggressive thing going on.

 

When I didn't want to deal with the bigger problem and just wanted a page done, I raced him problem for problem, with skittles. The first person to get the correct answer got a skittle.

 

When I wanted to deal with the big issue, I gave him chores to do, and we read the Bible.

 

If you've got a little money to burn trying something you might not like, you might want to try Professor B. It's very teacher intensive like WRTR.

[EKS]

I would not skip the textbook problems. My son would also shut down at that age and what helped is for me to write the problems out on a small whiteboard (at the desk) and then to let him decide if he wanted to write himself or have me write for him. When I wrote for him, the rule was that he had to tell me *everything* I was supposed to write down.

[txmommyofboys]

I use Life of Fred exclusively right now *hides* and all 3 of my boys say it is thier favorite subject. I add some problems here and there if they need more practice.

[UrbanSue]

I use Life of Fred exclusively right now *hides* and all 3 of my boys say it is thier favorite subject. I add some problems here and there if they need more practice.

 

That's kind of good to hear, actually. It occurred to me as I was posting that some people use LOF exclusively.

 

I'm thinking we'll go ahead and do a lot of CWP orally and see if we can accelerate that way. He moves much faster if he doesn't have to write (even though he draws for about nine hours a day and has beautiful handwriting, he hates writing for school). And then daily LOF will be getting in plenty of other math as well.

 

I'm not worried about him NOT learning math so much as giving up on what I believe is a great program i.e. Singapore.

[boscopup]

I also think he's probably placed too low. If he can do CWP, he's already understanding the material well enough that the workbook exercises obviously aren't necessary.

 

My oldest doesn't like to write much either. He's gotten better, and he's able to do the individual exercises no problem now, but the reviews usually get split up across 2 or 3 days, depending on the length of the review. They get pretty long toward the end! We also don't do every review.

 

I have had a lot less of the slow-down behavior once I placed my son where he really was. When the material actually challenges him, he is more engaged. That doesn't mean he never has to do some practice/review problems that he clearly knows, but we don't do that stuff every single day. It's unnecessary.

 

Put the inner box checker away, and move through the material a bit faster. My oldest doesn't need manipulatives, so I don't use them with him. I teach the material briefly at the white board, do some textbook problems on the board together, then assign the workbook exercise (which is easy, but short). We later do CWP together at the white board. If he clearly understands a concept, we'll either skip the exercise or just do some of the problems (enough to say, "Yep, he knows it.").

 

You might also ask him flat out if the work is too easy or too hard. He may be able to tell you what's going on.

 

"Buddy Math" (working together on the exercises, you doing one, then him doing one, then you doing one, then him doing one, etc.) may also work well. My son is more likely to write if he knows he doesn't have to write all of it. ;)

[letsplaymath]

... But we get to the workbook and he just shuts down. He sat before a three-page review section for five hours yesterday. Dh came home and I was at the end of my rope. Dh pulled out the level two CWP book (which we've never used since I don't want to add more to his math!) and sat with him. Ds did several problems as hard or harder than what he'd been doing for me and he did it all cheerfully and in his head ...

 

Workbook-style arithmetic (the main thrust of Singapore 2A) seems unnatural to most children. Word problems are much easier to visualize and solve. Even plain arithmetic is easier when done mentally, rather than according to the standard pencil-and-paper algorithms 2A is trying to teach. If your child is more intuitive than average with math, I would expect this problem to be greater than average --- just as you describe!

 

... I'm thinking of sticking with Singapore, teaching new concepts with manipulatives but then skipping all the textbook/workbook and going straight to CWP ... Will JUST CWP and LOF be enough math? Will we be missing something important? ...

 

No, you will not miss anything important that could not be easily added in later. Even if you did no formal (schoolish) math until 4-5th grade, your son would learn just fine as long as you talk and reason with him about whatever math comes up in normal life. I took this delayed-arithmetic approach with my older three students, and Benzet did it successfully with several classrooms of kids.

 

If you can't bear to give up the workbooks (or whenever you reach the point that you want to add them back in), buddy math works well, as boscopup mentioned. In a way, it is like Charlotte Mason-style narration applied to math, since the student has to process his thoughts in order to explain how he worked the problem, which fixes the math concepts more deeply in his mind.

 

... Zaccaro's Primary Challenge Math is rec'd a lot...

 

The Zaccaro books are excellent!

 

I would LOVE to accelerate him and let him test out but when I give him a review lesson as a test he stares at if for five hours. So . . . what?

I would not skip the textbook problems. My son would also shut down at that age and what helped is for me to write the problems out on a small whiteboard (at the desk) and then to let him decide if he wanted to write himself or have me write for him. When I wrote for him, the rule was that he had to tell me *everything* I was supposed to write down.

 

 

IMO, Singapore reviews tend to be harder than the regular lesson problems. None of my kids, even the most mathy, did well with them working alone. But doing them orally, with a whiteboard and with me taking dictation worked very well.

[letsplaymath]

... I'm not worried about him NOT learning math so much as giving up on what I believe is a great program i.e. Singapore.

 

 

I hear you there! My younger two kids "suffered through" a lot more schoolish math than my older ones did, just because I discovered the Singapore Primary Math program. *I* wanted to use it, and so I dragged them along.

 

Still, don't let the textbook master you. Much of the work can be done orally and with the whiteboard (and using buddy math). The pencil-and-paper arithmetic sections can be skipped (or "saved" until later, whenever you might find that you need them). The strength of Singapore Math is not in the way that it teaches the standard methods, which is pretty much the same all around the world, but in the way that it uses visual algebra (those bar diagrams) and mental math to help children learn to reason their way through math problems. And in the problem-solving approach to geometry, as opposed to the memorize-lots-of-vocabulary approach many American elementary books use.

[UrbanSue]

Thanks, Denise. That was all really helpful. We worked through several problems in CWP today and it was amazing too me what he was willing and capable of doing in his head. And the problems seemed to really spark his imagination. And since we were doing them first rather than at the end of a long arithmetic slog, he had the energy for it.

 

I will look at Zaccaro as well, thanks!

[longnightmoon]

Not sure if this helps but I just tried 1A Singapore with my daughter and she got way overstimulated by the presentation of the problems on the page. It was way too busy for her. She usually loves math but could not do a single problem, problems she can easily answer in another format. I've learned that workbooks need to be uncluttered and black and white without pictures for her. I haven't seen other levels of Singapore so I dont have experience there but thought I'd mention it all the same.

 

All the best,

Edie

[Sahamamama]

If I were in your shoes, I would ask my husband to teach math, or at least be The Consultant. He has greater access to your son's brain, LOL. He is the mathy parent. Even if he meets with your son only once a week (1 hour?), his insight might help you both know what course to take. I'm not sure this is just about curriculum.

 

My oldest daughter is a Math Dawdler. She's fast enough with everything else. To counteract the daydreaming, I now assign her written math work (the workbook) immediately before free time or outdoor time -- which begins X minutes after the start of the written math work (depends on the amount assigned). For example: If you get it done by ____ a.m., you go out the door. If not, you finish your work, and then go out the door. Free time ends at ____ a.m., so if your math work takes the entire time, you miss your free time. This has motivated her.

 

Something else that helped was simply moving forward to new material. I was trying to complete every single stinking problem of every single stinking lesson. As though having it written was PROOF that she knew it, or a guarantee of no gaps. Wow. She was bored. Do more orally. Do more together, out loud, in your head, as a game. OR SKIP IT. She was amazed when I started X-ing out huge sections of lessons in red ink with the comment, "You know that, let's move on." Next. This also motivated her. She said, "Well, math is finally getting interesting around here." :rolleyes:

 

We also break up the seat work with lots of other things -- Education Unboxed (uses C-rods), Thinking Blocks, Maths Dictionary for Kids, Hands-On Standards, Miquon Math Lab (uses C-rods), Living Math, Math Fact Drill, and just goofing off with our math manipulatives. This has motivated her. And they've been great for me, because I am not the mathy parent in our house (understatement).

 

The best decision I made this year was to stop rushing and pushing her to finish all her math work in 30--45 minutes. She just would NOT do it, and it was making us both irritated with each other -- and with math. I thought, "Who says math has to be done in half an hour?" I set the timer for one hour, and we work on math the entire time, as a group, every school day. I used to start with the written work, and use the "fun stuff" as a carrot. But now I think she's happier and better focused when we get into "math mode" in more interactive, exploratory, hands-on, and fun ways. The seat work and drills still get done -- and get done more on her own time (while I'm making lunch, LOL) -- but now I'm not short-changing her on the creative, interesting side of math that she needs and learns from.

 

We also are working on emotional management. We call it "Math Mind." This means that when we work on math, we are going to to be Persistent Problem Solvers, not Little Girls Who Fall Apart. We are going to think rationally, not with tears, frustration, stalling, getting upset at speed drills, freaking out when we can't solve a problem in a nanosecond.... (Perfectionistic firstborn?) This is a work in progress, but I am glad I realized the need to address it directly with this child. She has come a long way in a short time.

 

Along with this, we are working on Problem Solving Strategies. For example, she used to fall apart when she came across a problem she couldn't figure out immediately, or made a simple mistake in calculation, or even if she just missed a problem. :confused: We had to work on "getting into Math Mind," which does not involve falling apart. Now re-read the problem. Do not think about it or try to solve it. Just read it. Do you understand the words? Do the words have patterns? What are the relationships of the parts? the whole? How would you diagram this? label this? Now solve this. Now check this.

 

HTH.

[Crimson Wife]

My kids do/did Singapore PM with just the textbook, CWP, and IP (harder/more interesting problems only). The end-of-chapter reviews are overkill when they are scheduled, so I save them to do on Fridays 1 semester behind.

[Kathleen in LV]

Here's another vote for LOF.

 

My 6 yo son was near the end of Level 1 of MEP & told me he hated math (he previously loved math). So we took a break from that, and now we're doing exclusively LOF. He LOVES it. He even asks to read it on weekends. (And frankly, I find it quite entertaining.)

 

However, when I say exclusively, I mean it's the only formal program we use. Every morning I put a combination of 4 or 5 different types of practice problems on the white board for him. Lately I've been putting things like a clock problem, some basic multiplication problems, a multi-digit subtraction problem, and a problem calculating the area & perimeter of a rectangle. He has to complete those before we do Fred. IMO, Fred doesn't have enough practice for some of the concepts, but I also know my son would be miserable sitting down to 20 multi-digit subtraction problems every day. Even though LOF tells you the student should write down all his answers, we do a lot orally.

 

I would try LOF & do it however it works for your son. You can decide where he needs more practice and where he doesn't need as much. But I think if LOF helps him to enjoy math, it's so worth it!

 

Good luck!

[UrbanSue]

Not sure if this helps but I just tried 1A Singapore with my daughter and she got way overstimulated by the presentation of the problems on the page. It was way too busy for her. She usually loves math but could not do a single problem, problems she can easily answer in another format. I've learned that workbooks need to be uncluttered and black and white without pictures for her. I haven't seen other levels of Singapore so I dont have experience there but thought I'd mention it all the same.

 

All the best,

Edie

 

My ds is distracted easily and I wonder if the black and white presentation of CWP helped him out today.

[txmommyofboys]

Mine love oral as opposed to writing also! Or theyblike doing work on the whiteboard. I think your plan sounds great :)

 

 

That's kind of good to hear, actually. It occurred to me as I was posting that some people use LOF exclusively.

 

I'm thinking we'll go ahead and do a lot of CWP orally and see if we can accelerate that way. He moves much faster if he doesn't have to write (even though he draws for about nine hours a day and has beautiful handwriting, he hates writing for school). And then daily LOF will be getting in plenty of other math as well.

 

I'm not worried about him NOT learning math so much as giving up on what I believe is a great program i.e. Singapore.