Singapore Scheduling

[dmmm]

How do you do it?

 

I love Singapore, but between the textbook, workbook, tests, CWP...it seems to take up such a big chunk of time. My dd is doing well, but she can only sit for so long before she checks out.

 

How do you schedule Singapore during the week?

[elizabeth rose]

I don't do CWP or any other supplements beyond the MM, which ireally isn't a supplement for this reason. It takes us an hour to do the instructor guide stuff if needed, text and workbook. I usually look at what is scheduled for the week in the HIG and go from there. I sometimes skip something, but basically I look at the IG, teach the concept, then go to the text, we do that together, and then we do the workbook.

With my oldest, I tried for a while to do cwp and IP, but then we were doing math forever. If I was going to use them again, I would just throw a problem or two at them a day, for a drill , not try to do the whole workbook.

[SFM]

We do the textbook, then we it directs we go on to the workbook exercise, then I have him do a page (max. 3 questions), a day. Some days it takes MAX 45-60 minutes and the fastest could be as little as 20-30 minutes. We do not do the tests. So, textbook, workbook, and CWP everyday. Oh, we also do LoF MWF, a chapter a day. I don't make him write out the the "It's Your Turn to Play" and sometimes with the textbooks we work them together or do the problems orally.

[boscopup]

I don't use the tests.

 

Open HIG. Teach lesson, going over textbook problems as needed. Send kid off to do workbook. That part takes us 20-30 minutes for kid in 5B. Kid in 1B takes about 10-15 minutes for everything.

 

At a separate time, I do CWP with big kid. Little kids isn't using CWP yet. We probably spend 20 minutes doing a couple pages of CWP together at the white board.

[sweetpea3829]

I do a rotating schedule. So this week, I have teacher-led math instruction on Thursday and Friday and then Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of next week. And then Thursday and Friday of the following week. So basically, they have five days in a row of teacher-led instruction, followed by five days in a row for review.

 

When I do teacher-led instruction, I work through the corresponding workbook pages with them during that time. Every day, my children have a folder with several pages of independent work from the various subject areas. For math, there will be a page of drill, a page of review, a word-problem page, a logic/critical thinking page. Not necessarily all of those every day, but you get the idea. Ahead of time, I pull pages from various resources and stuff their folders.

 

So basically, I end up using the other Singapore workbooks throughout the year as review, and to cement concepts. On the days when I am not giving teacher-led math instruction, they still have those workbook pages, but they complete them independently.

 

Also, I found that I still had too much work for them to do, so I put aside the Singapore testbook and I'm going to use that for review over the summer.

[elizabeth rose]

I don't know how some of you do it so quickly.

[MrsBanjoClown]

We go over the lesson in the HIG. Sometimes we play the games and do the activities and sometimes we don't. We go over the textbook problems together if it is not a review. Then they do the workbook pages for that lesson. Sometimes they will work ahead in the workbook if they find the concept easy. DS8 does the extra practice for the concept and also the CWP on separate days before he takes the test. It is taking longer to get through the book, but I like the extra practice he is getting. DS6 is flying through 1B and will probably finish it before the end of the year. He doesn't do CWP or Extra Practice. I have the IP for 1B that he will do when he finishes.

[blondeviolin]

We do HIG and workbook nearly simultaneously. Then I pass on the workbook pages and she does them while I sit next to her. If the page is super easy, I pull out some CWP or something. We do it a semester or so behind so it's a review. We'll finish the CWP over the summer.

[Kipling]

I teach from the TB then the kids do the page(s) from the WB. I don't use the test book, but I use the reviews in the TB and WB as tests for me to see what they have retained. I give them problems from CWP about two times a week, trying to put those on days when the workbook assignment is light.

[nono]

I teach from the textbook, both sections (I have one in 1B and the other in 3B), and then we do some of the workbook. CWP I only started this year with my older, and we do them for fun, while we're waiting for something to start or end (sports practice). I do use the tests. After every even unit I use a cumulative test. (For my younger, I use ever odd unit...working off of one test book for both students). The rest of the tests I use as homework for practice.

 

We also do one Miquon book per grade year as another way to cement ideas.

 

My kids aren't fast in math. They are thorough. We sometimes take 2 hours to get through math. If math is going poorly, we table it, go onto other assignments, and then start it again late in the afternoon. My kids love math though, so it isn't a burden to them to have it 2x a day sometimes.

[MinivanMom]

We don't do the tests.

 

I teach the concepts, then we do any textbook problems together, and then they do the workbook pages independently. It takes 30-45 min depending on the day. If it looks like it is going to take longer than that, I will split up the lesson over two days.

 

We use the CWP a semester behind and we do the whole thing in one huge sweep. So when we were halfway through 2A, we took a break and spent a month working through all of CWP1 When we were halfway through 3A, we took a break and spent a month working through all of CWP2. You get the idea. When we are working through CWP, we will work the sample problems together and then they do the assigned problems independently. If it's a more challenging section, then we will take two days to work through it. The first day I will assign the regular problems and the second day I will assign the Challenging Problems.

[redsquirrel]

I am on my second trip through SM. I really like the schedules in the HIG. I do try to use those. So, I go over whatever is covered in the text, I do the problems in the text and then we do the workbook assignment. If the workbook assignment is long then I might cut short the questions I do from the text. As my son got older (around 4th grade) he started to balk at doing the problems in both and asked if he could just get to the workbook. He was saying "I got it, I am ready to go!" so I let him do that. I do incorporate the reviews etc as scheduled in the HIG. I don't give tests, but I do use the placement tests on the SM site as an assessment at the end of each book. I also use the placement tests from the previous year as a beginning of the year review.

 

I do put my cuisinaire rods and base 10 to work! If there is any difficulty or a wrong answer that is how we find the correct answer. I also have the CWP and we use it one year behind for review. I go back and forth between having that be our Friday math, and working it in when we can. As long as we get through most of the book in one school year I figure we are doing well.

 

What I don't do: I don't do the games and stuff in the HIG. We just don't like that, and my sons haven't needed that approach. I fit in the mental math when I can, but don't sweat it. My sons both seem to be able to calculate pretty well in their heads...a little too well if you ask me. Writing out work becomes and issue around 5th grade, but that seems to be a universal problem with middle grades and math.

 

What I wish: that SM would update those computer games. I own all three, but they are so old that they won't work on any of my computers. My older son used them and really, really liked them. My younger son was really looking forward to using them.

[Alice]

My oldest is fairly mathy and gets the concepts quickly. With him I typically go over one chapter/concept/section on Monday and give him a few problems to do out of the IP book. We’ve gotten to the point where he just uses the IP book. Then over the rest of the week I assign him a mix of problems from the IP book, I try and have him do some word problems and challenging word problems each day. If it’s a totally new concept that is more difficult he will do less of the challenging problems. I don’t use tests unless you mean the “mid-year review†or the other “reviews†in the workbook or IP book.

 

My middle son is less mathy. I use a similar procedure but just break it down in littler chunks for him.

 

In general, we have days when we do are doing more textbook/simpler problems and days when they do harder problems but nothing new. I decide how fast or slow to go based on how well they seem to understand the concept. For some things they do every problem out of the IP book, for some they do roughly half.

[UrbanSue]

We set a time limit for math and take whatever time is needed for each concept. Most days we can complete a chapter of LOF, four problems from CWP, and one or two lessons (HIG, TB,WB) from SM in about an hour. My dd really likes math, though, and she's a quick learner. I keep an eye on the schedule at the start of the HIG for a rough guide but we are usually ahead of it.

[boscopup]

As my son got older (around 4th grade) he started to balk at doing the problems in both and asked if he could just get to the workbook. He was saying "I got it, I am ready to go!" so I let him do that. I do incorporate the reviews etc as scheduled in the HIG. I don't give tests, but I do use the placement tests on the SM site as an assessment at the end of each book. I also use the placement tests from the previous year as a beginning of the year review.

 

I forgot to mention that yes, we don't do ALL the textbook problems if it's clear my son gets it (particularly the one in 5B... the one in 1B usually does all problems anyway, because they help solidify facts). Also, textbook is done completely orally. We write nothing for that part. And I also use the placement tests at the end of a book to say, "Yep, we can move on!"

 

Both of my kids using it are mathy and pick this stuff up fairly quickly. I don't necessarily do everything the HIG says to do, but I make sure I'm teaching it properly. Some lessons are longer or shorter than average. When we were doing ratios, I went ahead and did 2 lessons a day because 1 lesson was only taking about 10 minutes, start to finish. The kid gets ratios and has zero trouble with them. He needed a little more time with the percent tax section, where he was trying to figure out what a tax was exactly. :tongue_smilie:

[UrbanSue]

I forgot to mention that yes, we don't do ALL the textbook problems if it's clear my son gets it (particularly the one in 5B... the one in 1B usually does all problems anyway, because they help solidify facts). Also, textbook is done completely orally. We write nothing for that part. And I also use the placement tests at the end of a book to say, "Yep, we can move on!"

 

Both of my kids using it are mathy and pick this stuff up fairly quickly. I don't necessarily do everything the HIG says to do, but I make sure I'm teaching it properly. Some lessons are longer or shorter than average. When we were doing ratios, I went ahead and did 2 lessons a day because 1 lesson was only taking about 10 minutes, start to finish. The kid gets ratios and has zero trouble with them. He needed a little more time with the percent tax section, where he was trying to figure out what a tax was exactly. :tongue_smilie:

 

 

This is a good point--we also do the TB completely orally and only as much as they seem to need. If the text is too difficult, we return to the HIG and do more of what's there. If the text is easy, we move on the WB quickly. That is the routine with my math-loving workbook-loving dd, anyway. My ds is strong, conceptually, but hates workbooks. With him I did much of the TB orally and skipped the WB, for the most part. The TB is typically a bit more challenging than the WB.