Premade, flexible scope/sequence for math?

[silver]

I'm continually drawn to MOTL. For me it's the flexibility of sequence/speed and the gentle, continual review of concepts using the 5-a-day problems that I'm drawn to. But my husband says that we are not buying a $300 curriculum this year (or even a $150 used copy). It probably doesn't help that I already have the MM dark blue series, so it's not like we need a new math curriculum.

 

Right now we're using MM dark blue sequenced to match the light blue series. My son is bored out of his mind. I'm only having him do a few problems per page to try to speed through to find where he should be (we often easily get through 2 pages a day), but even that is slow going. I need something more flexible so that I can get him to a point of not too hard/not too easy.

 

I am comfortable with teaching new concepts to my children without all the idea books that MOTL comes with. What I don't think I could do is to break apart everything into concepts and know what needs to be taught before what and what concepts replace what. Well, I probably could, but it would take a very long time and I'd probably always be second guessing myself that I'm leaving out some concept. MOTL does that for you, it even has built things like once you start long division you no longer need to practice subtraction (because long division has plenty of that).

 

Is there any resource out there that does that? Something that breaks math down into the concepts with a BFSU style flow chart to show you what concepts are prerequisites for each new one? I've got a little bit of birthday money, so I can buy something if it's a reasonable price.

 

 

 

[hmschooling]

http://www.hslaunch.com/mypage/profile/9112  Scroll down on here to the Uncatagorized section and I have two titled Math Checklists..... you'll want to check out the Beechick books to fully understand these if you like them.

[Miss Tick]

What you described sounds like the "Dr. Wright's Kitchen Table Math" books. There are three but you could probably skip book 1 since it is geared for 2-8 y.o.s. They are not particularly sequential. Basically each section introduces a topic to the teacher, talks about any prerequisites the student should have studied, the author's approach to teaching it, ideas for expanding on the topic.

 

They are published by the Art of Problem Solving folks, and there are some reviews and explanation on that sight.

[silver]

Thanks! The Kitchen Table Math book looks like exactly what I was looking for. Just placed an order on Amazon!

[Hunter]

I was talked out of MOTL for about a year. I bought it a couple weeks before my finances crashed. I could still send it back for a refund but won't.

 

I hate to review anything until I've used it at least 2 months.

 

Do I think this is worth $300.00? I don't know. I think it depends.

 

So far I'm not going hungry to hold onto the curriculum, despite the mess that has just hit me, but I was reduced to walking 5 miles in this heat carrying over 20 pounds of vegetables the last mile and half. And I washed my stinky clothes out by hand afterwards rather than paying to use a machine. :lol:

 

We all have different ideas of what is worth it. I have very odd spending habits and people are all over my case this week. People are throwing money at me and I'm throwing it back, and demanding to be allowed to do it my way. Except the food. I let them feed me. :lol: It makes them happy.

 

I had family math on order once and then canceled at the last minute, so have never seen it.

 

I don't know what to tell you.

[edeemarie]

Check out Maximum Math by Kathryn Stout...it sounds like what you might be looking for:)

[Farrar]

Why not just use MM's table of contents as a scope and sequence?  And it's so inexpensive that you could buy the books still (or, if you have them all, keep using them) and only occasionally use a few pages, but mostly just teach it on your own.

[silver]

Oh, Hunter! I knew you had bought MOTL from some other thread somewhere, and it wasn't helping my desire at all! I know that you have similar leanings in curricula as I do, and made me want it even more! :laugh:

 

I have Family Math. It is more a collection of activities that use math concepts/skills than a scope/sequence. I had been under the mistaken impression that Kitchen Table Math was similar.

 

I think I'll be using Kitchen Table Math (it comes Tuesday!) for the concepts and use MM for practice problems. I plan on setting up my own 5-a-day practice schedule with the KTM concepts. I have ANKI on my computer and tablet, so I'll use that for the spaced repetition of concepts. I'm going to play around with it and see if I can get something together using that.

 

[Hunter]

You will do fine without MOTL. Honestly. It's really my OCD that made it so attractive to me. It's not that I think I'll do a better job teaching with it, it's just that I hope I'll stop looking at other things and spending more money in the long run. I'm hoping I'll just rest with this. I'm actually giving away things I think are better.

 

I'm just trying to decide if I want to scan this whole curriculum. If I'd known things were going to start falling apart here so much, I would have bought the old light blue MM pdfs. Part of me is glad I didn't know, because MOTL has been calling my name for so long. And it is all I'd hoped it would be and more. But it's still a lot to lug around. I bought it before the iPad.

 

I think the suggested scope and sequence in a good one, so I think I will probably just scan the pages in the order of the scope and sequence and scan as I go, with the iPad scanner app.

 

I didn't know I'd said I bought MOTL. My memory loss is so much better than it was, but I still have blackouts, and have been having more of them with the recent stress. I just hate to post new curriculum infatuation. I thought I'd managed to keep quiet, but I guess not. :lol:

 

Also I feel guilty about buying MOTL and charging a iPad mini so close to each other. It was a LOT of money. Purchases I was willing to sacrifice for if others around me would just let me sacrifice for and stop bugging me about them. I'm not asking them to make things easier for me. Books and devices are worth it to ME. I want them more than the things THEY look at as basic survival.

 

I'm crashing at a friend's place today. This person doesn't know what to do with me, I can tell. And advice and pressure just makes me more erratic, so they stopped, and went to buy me some strawberries. :lol:

[silver]

Maybe it wasn't that you had mentioned getting it but that you've mentioned it in a couple of curricula threads lately? Who knows...

 

Could you just scan in the 5-a-days in order of the MOTL suggested scope-sequence? I would assume that with your experience that a lot of the topics you know how to teach already without having to look at the suggestions in the guides.

 

 

[Amy Jo]

Silver will you post and tell us how using KTM this way works out?

[Hunter]

Maybe it wasn't that you had mentioned getting it but that you've mentioned it in a couple of curricula threads lately? Who knows...

 

Could you just scan in the 5-a-days in order of the MOTL suggested scope-sequence? I would assume that with your experience that a lot of the topics you know how to teach already without having to look at the suggestions in the guides.

I really like the instructions. I like the focus on using money as a manipulative. I'm seriously thinking of undoing the binding and just scanning the entire curriculum and saving it in every free online storage cloud available, multiple thumb drives, and anything else I can think of. :lol:

 

I really do like this thing. It's like a shot of anti-OCD drug. :lol: Again I don't think it's going to make me a better tutor. I just don't. Well maybe if having it puts me in better general mental health. Or am I just enabling my condition?

[silver]

Silver will you post and tell us how using KTM this way works out?

 

If I remember, I can post how progress is going once we've been doing it for a bit.

 

My current plan is to mark topics that I think he could benefit from reviewing more and which ones he's ready to start learning. Then I'll start doing 5 problems a day on the review topics to assess how frequently to do those and introduce about one topic a week doing example problems and lots of hands on stuff. On days where there isn't 1-on-1 work with a new topic, we'll do RS math games to work on fact memorization.

[silver]

We've been doing this for two weeks, which isn't very long, but I thought I'd share how I'm working it out.

 

I went through KTM and listed out all the concepts/activities/games in a spreadsheet. Then I split it into 5 categories:

* Stuff my son knows well enough to not need to review

* Stuff my son knows, but could use more review on

* Stuff I plan on teaching in the next few weeks

* Stuff my son is ready to learn, but that I will wait to teach

* Stuff my son is not yet ready to learn

 

The things that he needs to review went into an ANKI deck. I have the desktop program and the Android app. There's a web based version if someone has an iPad and doesn't want to pay $25 for a spaced repetition flashcard app. Each ANKI card has a number to help me identify the concept (KTM book, chapter, section, and activity number if there are multiple activities/concepts in a section), a "title", and a page number and book number for me to look it up in. The ANKI deck is set to review 6 cards a day.

 

I put together an Excel spreadsheet that lists a description of an activity or generates a random problem to solve for each concept that my son will be reviewing (for example, if the concept is doubles, Excel might choose "5" for a number between 1 and 10, resulting in the problem "5 x 2 = " being generated). For things where it's hard to have Excel generate a problem (like telling time), I have instructions to practice it with manipulatives, or play a Right Start game, or instructions on how to play a non-RS game.

 

For the concepts I'll be teaching in the next few weeks, I went through all my various teacher books (KTM, MM, Miquon Lab Sheet Annotations, a Montessori Math Album, and a few others) for ideas on presenting the concepts. I also requested some living math books from the library.  I'll introduce 1-2 concepts a week (depending on the topic and how related it is to things he already knows).

 

Our math lesson consists of either reading a book, playing a game, me presenting a topic to him, or a couple of MM problems (I don't want to "fall behind" in case I decide to go back to MM after trying this for bit and having it become a massive failure--we'll probably drop the MM stuff once I'm confident that this is working in progressing my son in math). That takes anywhere from 5-20 minutes, depending on how much he's enjoying the topic. Then we do 6 practice problems. The practice problems vary from about 5 minutes if they're all simple and straight forward (arithmetic, skip counting, etc) to 15ish if we have a game to play. I chose 6 practice problems a day instead of MOTL's 5 because these review concepts are pretty easy for him right now, and there are a lot of topics to rotate through. Once ANKI "learns" where my son is at, we might drop down to 5.

 

To do the 6 practice problems I wrote an add-on for ANKI desktop that pulls the number of the KTM book-chapter-section-activity number for the next 6 cards that are due, puts those numbers into a text file, and then opens that file in notepad. I copy those numbers and paste them into a spreadsheet. The spreadsheet uses Excel formulas to pull in problems or activities form the list I made previously. Then I save the worksheet that was generated as a PDF and print.

 

As my son is working, I make a mental note if each problem is hard, just right, or easy for him. When he's done, I pull up the deck in ANKI and answer how he did on each concept. ANKI then schedules when we should next cover each concept based on how my son has been doing with it.

 

It's working well so far, and math is now a favorite subject with my son again. He gets to choose every other school thing we do, and he'll choose math as his 1st or 2nd choice every day. I've introduced the concept of probability (drawing marbles from an opaque bag, using a spinner that isn't divided evenly, reading some books) and some arithmetic strategies that the KTM book suggests. I haven't been at this long enough to have full confidence in it--as I cannot see yet if my son will make progress in his skills and abilities--but we both like it so far.

 

Let me know if you have any questions on our implementation of this. I'd be glad to answer them. :)

[SorrelZG]

Silver, I just stand dumbfounded and in awe of you.

[Down_the_Rabbit_Hole]

Check out Maximum Math by Kathryn Stout...it sounds like what you might be looking for:)

 

This is my recommendation also. We have used it in the past and found it to be very helpful. It has a list of everything needed for each grade (usually listed in groups of 2-3 grades) which you pick the order you want to teach. It also has a section on how to teach these skills in a very easy to understand, no nonsense way.

 

[Miss Tick]

Wow. You have combined a bunch of resources and discrete elements into what sounds like a smart, straight-forward system for teaching math at your son's level and speed. I can't imagine a scenario where this would ever reach "massive failure" Very impressive. I hope it continues to be successful!

[Amy Jo]

I put together an Excel spreadsheet that lists a description of an activity or generates a random problem to solve for each concept that my son will be reviewing (for example, if the concept is doubles, Excel might choose "5" for a number between 1 and 10, resulting in the problem "5 x 2 = " being generated). For things where it's hard to have Excel generate a problem (like telling time), I have instructions to practice it with manipulatives, or play a Right Start game, or instructions on how to play a non-RS game.

 

...

 

To do the 6 practice problems I wrote an add-on for ANKI desktop that pulls the number of the KTM book-chapter-section-activity number for the next 6 cards that are due, puts those numbers into a text file, and then opens that file in notepad. I copy those numbers and paste them into a spreadsheet. The spreadsheet uses Excel formulas to pull in problems or activities form the list I made previously. Then I save the worksheet that was generated as a PDF and print.

 

Wow. I'm in awe. You kinda lost me at the ANKI add-on though. How do you see what cards are coming? I think I would just add a link to a worksheet generator for that type of problem. Now I'm re-re-rethinking math.

 

Amy

[silver]

Silver, I just stand dumbfounded and in awe of you.

 

:o Thanks.

 

Wow. You have combined a bunch of resources and discrete elements into what sounds like a smart, straight-forward system for teaching math at your son's level and speed. I can't imagine a scenario where this would ever reach "massive failure" Very impressive. I hope it continues to be successful!

 

:blushing: Thanks for the vote of confidence! I'm hoping it continues to work well and that my son continues to enjoy math.

 

Wow. I'm in awe. You kinda lost me at the ANKI add-on though. How do you see what cards are coming? I think I would just add a link to a worksheet generator for that type of problem. Now I'm re-re-rethinking math.

 

Amy

 

The ANKI add-on is programed in phython. It pulls the cards from the KTM concept deck, sorts them by due date, and grabs the next 6 to be due. That could also be done just by looking in the card browser for ANKI. You can look at cards for a specific deck and sort by due date to see which ones will be shown next.

 

Or, as you said, you could put a link in the ANKI card to a worksheet generator or other website that has the proper type of problem. Then you could just study the deck and follow the links for each concept to do a problem or two (cutting out the Excel worksheet maker). My son prefers to do school away from the computer, so I wanted a way to be able to print the problems he had for each day.

 

[Ecclecticmum]

Another option could be to get the MOTL support package. Its a digital support package from the website and is around $25. It contains a few things (I'm not on the computer its on) like 5 a day spreadsheets etc, and in one of the manual 5 a day spreadsheet sets is the concept chart, and recommended/suggested sequence chart, so if this is all you are wanting, $25 and you have it, to use how you want. If you are unaware of what a particular item is in the concept chart, then google it or just ask, and I'm sure you'd get an answer.

 

I use MOTL as my go-to spine that keeps me on top of what is going on between the 3 kids. I don't do 5 a days yet (although I do make them up every now and again just for fun when the kids ask me to), I use ideas from the parts we are working on as well as living math books & Montessori Math, miquon, math games and a gazillion other things (we are really random, so I needed a spine, I have MOTL projects/adventures going on, family math projects from Family Math or out of Mathstart or MathArts, Kids might choose to do Math Mammoth or Spunky Worksheets (I just have these at their level, they choose what they want), I present Montessori Math materials, then they are available for the kids, plus other things we have going on that I really needed one program that wouldn't change, no matter what, and MOTL is that, I use ideas out of it, and later on will use parts of it more fully (individualised for each child) alongside montessori (Independant/multi-level) & living math (family math) BUT if I was just wanting to use it for the concepts/sequence, I would just get the support package, its much cheaper, and can be kept on the computer or "printed" with something like BULLPDF and turned into a PDF, put onto IAnnotate on Ipad, and concepts ticked off as done.

 

I would just use the detailed Montessori math scope I have as a sequence, but Montessori can sometimes be missing certain things (like money, extra fraction work, certain clock-reading etc) that I just trust my MOTL scope more (and if one of my children stray from the Montessori path, I need something a bit more mainstream in ideas & approach to watch them).

 

Another option (not sure whether its already been mentioned) might be Kathryn Stouts Math guide. It probably is a scope & sequence.

 

I'm one who now likes just a flexible scope/overview for every subject, luckily Montessori provides that. So does my Waldorf Overview (Christopherus). For Mainstream overviews I would suggest getting WTM or Home Learning Year by Year by Rebecca Rupp. Rupp's one is good as you just pay a small price for a paperback then have a detailed enough overview for all subjects that you could just use the library and your wits :p I happen to have all 4. I'm wanting 1st ed of WTM in paperback (I only have current ed in Kindle, I hate reference books in kindle format. Pity SWB doesn't just sell the 1st ed in PDF format (printable) then I could just purchase it from her, she gets money and I get the 1st edition without having to sniff out an acceptable copy from a trustable seller, its driving me loopy trying to get it without wasting money and without paying a fortune.)

 

Bah, I'm rambling again....

[Hunter]

This is the ISBN# fo the 1st edition TWTM, but the picture is different, so it's unknown what the seller is selling unless you contact them.

 

http://www.amazon.com/The-Well-Trained-Mind-Classical-Education/dp/0393047520/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1376236089&sr=8-3&keywords=the+well+trained+mind

 

The ISBN# is more important than the picture. So if you order and don't get the 1st edition, then the seller is the one responsible to give you a free refund, even if the picture matches. I recommend hitting "buy" if you see a good copy, then immediately sending a confirmation request e-mail to the seller about the ISBN#.

 

I too would really like to get a pdf copy of the 1st edition TWTM.

 

And a PDF version of MOTL.