A Question re: Saxon Math

[Teachnmama]

For those of you who use Saxon math - Is it necessary to do all of the problems in each lesson as the book suggests. Does odd or evens get the job done or is there a reason to do all of the problems? Any thoughts or suggestions would be appreciated. :bigear:

 

By the way, the is for a 4th grade boy using Saxon 5/4

[Sue G in PA]

You'll get an opinion on both sides of this question! With Saxon, there are a variety of different types of problems in each lesson. You have word problems first, then some review of previous material, then you'll get to the current lesson's material (just a few problems) and then some more review. To do just odds/evens, I was always afraid my dc would "miss" something. It is quite possible. Instead of assigning odds/evens, I would take the time to go through the lesson and circle each problem I wanted dc to do based on where I thought she needed the review. I would always have her do all the problems pertaining to the current lessons and all the word problems. Many do assign odd/evens w/ no problem, though. HTH

[Nestof3]

When my son was in older grades, I only required him to do half the problems unless his work began to suffer, then he would have to do all of the problems for a while. I knew with my son that he knew how to do the problems, but he would grow weary of school work and start to slack off periodically. His errors were careless in nature. So, this served as a good reminder for him.

[Amber]

We do odds or even and then see how your child does. It's kind of the carrot. If they do well then you move on. If they need extra work then they can do the others.

amber

[charlotteb]

We are doing 7/6 and my son does only odd or even each day. He has a very short attention span and would start to "lose it" if he had to do all the problems. I knew that he could do the material because he would get all the problems right for a while and then you can see where he lost his attention. Someone on here told me that the Saxon people don't know YOUR child so what they recommend (do all problems) isn't going to work for everyone.

[Meljoy]

I have my son do all of the set that go with the new concept learned in the lesson (usually 5 or 6 problems) -and then about 15 out of the problem set -I used to just assign odd or even but I feel he gets a better mix -or I can control the mix he gets ( more in an area I see he needs extra practice in like adding fractions for example) so I circle the 15 or so I feel will benefit him most. I usually give all of the word problems and then if there are 4 on say long division I just assign one of those ect. If he misses any then I can always assign extra problems of that type. My son loved Saxon 5/4 last year and did VERY well in it.

[hs_gram]

We tried doing only even or odds, but invariably the problems that my children needed to work seemed to be in the opposite set! What we discovered worked better for us was to do the lesson and practice problems of two consecutive lessons and then do only one of those problem sets. That worked very well for both of my children. I generally had them do the second lesson (i.e. if they did practice problems on lesson 1 & 2, they did the problems set for lesson 2), however, at times I would choose the lesson based on what I thought fit their skills best.

 

Blessings,

Darlene

[Teachnmama]

I really appreciate your response and I can see now from many of your answers that there is more to consider than just odd/even - I am going to go back over the book again tonight with all of your suggestions in mind.

 

Blessings to all for your time!:lol:

[Melissa in Australia]

we do 1/2 a lesson each day, 1 to 14 one day ,and the other half the next day. we school year round, so still get through the books.

[VaKim]

I have my son do all of the set that go with the new concept learned in the lesson (usually 5 or 6 problems) -and then about 15 out of the problem set -I used to just assign odd or even but I feel he gets a better mix -or I can control the mix he gets ( more in an area I see he needs extra practice in like adding fractions for example) so I circle the 15 or so I feel will benefit him most. I usually give all of the word problems and then if there are 4 on say long division I just assign one of those ect. If he misses any then I can always assign extra problems of that type. My son loved Saxon 5/4 last year and did VERY well in it.

 

This is what we did when we used it. If she missed something, I could always pick another problem of the same type for her to do, after figuring out why she missed the first one.

[EKS]

Saxon's strentgh is getting math into long term memory and also getting students to be able to do lots of problems quickly. They also have this ingenus way of gradually leading the student through incremental levels of difficulty between the time the topic is introduced and when it is seen again. If you skip problems, you miss out on that aspect of it.

 

I'd say that if you feel like there are too many problems, you might want to look at another program. When you take away the thing that makes Saxon strong, it becomes a mediocre program at best. (I say this having used it with a child who needed to go faster and not do so many problems. I should have switched to Singapore instead of trying to make Saxon work for him.)

 

I have heard that if you really want to stick with Saxon and do fewer problems, you should have your child do every other problem set in full, rather than skip around or do evens/odds within a certain problem set.

[Ellie]

Yes, absolutely.

 

There's a method and a reason for every single problem in every single lesson. When you skip problem you're missing that method. Jann in TX, who is a certified math teacher, says that when she gets students who struggle with their Saxon, invariably it's because they had been doing evens/odds or some other method of skipping.

[Nestof3]

You know, I'm just not sure it's that simple. The problems are indeed repeated throughout the book, so skipping some doesn't mean the student will never encounter them again. Some people just don't need that much practice. For some, it gets cumbersome and the student actually begins rushing and making careless errors.

 

I also wonder how many of the moms check their student's work, look to see what problems were missed and why, and then require her student to correct all missed problems. No math sheet was filed away in this house unless each problem was correct. I was very involved in my son's math work.

[VaKim]

I also wonder how many of the moms check their student's work, look to see what problems were missed and why, and then require her student to correct all missed problems. No math sheet was filed away in this house unless each problem was correct. I was very involved in my son's math work.

 

Yep. We do that here.