I'm not sure Abeka math is working for us

[lgliser]

I know everyone says that if a curriculum isn't working, then change it.  I know that's the great thing about homeschooling - we can tailor it to our kids and how they learn.

 

I don't WANT to change just because it seems frustrating for me.  I've bought Abeka math and I'd LIKE it to work!  So if anyone wants to say "just hang in there, she'll get it, you'll see!" then please do!

 

But if not, that's why I'm posting here!  I have 6 year old triplets and we're on lesson 18.  My son is getting it.  I think he'd get any math.  But so far the girls, not so much.  They do story problems, and they have me illustrate with straws and all, so it's not JUST flashcards, but it is a lot of flashcards and just memorizing the facts.  I think it's good - shouldn't one be able to just rattle off the answers quickly like that?  But at the same time, I'm not sure the actual concept of what addition and subtraction are is sinking in.  

 

One of the girls really beats herself up when she doesn't complete a speed drill on time.  Should I stop with the speed drills?  It seems like good motivation to work on the facts, but maybe not?

 

I'd love honest advice :)  Should I change curriculum?  Should I supplement with something??  Help!

[Georgiana Daniels]

I'd definitely give up the speed drills. It stresses some kids out to be "on a timer" for things they're just learning. In fact, we don't do tests or anything "pressured" yet, and my kids are starting 4th and 5th grade this week. Of course, everyone is different so just do/don't do what works for your kids :)

[mumto2]

First grade was quite a long time ago for us. One thing we did because I had two close in age was set up activities that coordinated with schoolwork around my living room, someone called them stations, for when one was done and the other not. I remember making flash cards for everything involved in math facts. For addition and subtraction I would make a stack of 1+2, 1+3, .....in one color marker, and another of answers 3,4,5 etc. Set out ten cards on the floor and have them match the answers. Walk by and check and shuffle for the next child.

 

Other stations would be jigsaw puzzles, tangram puzzles, flashcards of words they knew to make a sentence. Time telling, skip counting, whatever I could think of. I made my cards out of scrap paper frequently. Generally I used them for several days but not right in a row. They loved these activities and it was pretty easy to set up.

 

I wouldn't give up quite this early. I would keep doing the speed drills just make the time a bit longer until she gets her facts down. I normally had more then one math book for each child at that age and would switch one out if they got stuck. Normally we could start again in a couple of weeks and they never knew they had been stuck. I hope this all makes some sense.

[Ellie]

Let the speed drills go.

 

I also wouldn't recommend giving up this early.

 

And I wouldn't be worried so much that your dds aren't t understanding the "concept of addition and subtraction." It is a simple concept: addition means you start with some and add some more; subtraction means you start with some and take some away. No biggie. That they don't seem to be getting their math facts down pat doesn't mean they aren't  "understand the concept." And some of us have to do things like memorize math facts before we get the concept. :-)

[Spy Car]

 .

I suggest you really think about your goals and expectations for your children's math education.

 

You ask,"shouldn't one be able to just rattle off the answers quickly like that?" and the answer, from my perspective, is maybe yes, maybe not. 

 

Simply memorizing "math facts" proves a child is good at memorizing, but is no guarantee he or she understands the math. They may indeed understand it well, but the fast answers may create an illusion of false competence. And years of "passing along on the illusion of false competence" eventually ends in a crash, when memory is not good enough and the mathematical reasoning skills are inadequate.

 

"Speed drill" can cause terrible math anxiety. It is a potentially bad cycle with a child "who doesn't get it" doing poorly and ending convinced she is stupid, bad at math, and that math is a hateful subject. Some kids like speed drills, but they are almost always the ones who don't "need" them. Drilling math facts is a way to speed recall (build "automaticity") but not the way to "teach" math IMO.

 

It sounds very much to me like your girls need an approach that teaches for conceptual understanding, so they know what they are doing, as opposed to "memorizing" answers they don't really understand. There is a vast difference between these things.

 

You might see if you can get ahold of the book by Liping Ma, Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics, to see a different sort of math education.

 

Also, a WTM board member, Rosie, has made a series of videos with hands-on learning methods demonstrated. her website is called "Education Unboxed." Take a look and see if this is an approach you think would appeal to your children. Sometimes it just takes concrete means to "turn on the light-bulbs."

 

The "drill and kill" approach (with speed tests) is a very inferior and potentially dangerous method of teaching—particularly with children who are starting to feel like "math failures at 6."

 

The good news is there are multiple alternatives for pursuing early math educations that teach for depth, that honor children's development, that are hands-on. that are fun, and that are effective.

 

Bill

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Piper]

I ditto the suggestions to give up the speed drills.  They were a killer for my Wiggly Wilma dd8.  Still are, for that matter.  She has always hated them.  Flash cards are pretty useless for her, too.  To help her learn her math facts, we use "Addition the Fun Way" and now "Times Tables the Fun Way" as well as xtramath.com (she likes to race the teacher, surprisingly enough!) and daily practice with an app on my Nexus 7.  It's working.

 

My ds6 is more "mathy", and loves to do the speed drills, but gets discouraged when he doesn't get them all right in the allotted time, so my first step will be to (secretly!) increase the time allotted, and if it's still discouraging, I will ditch them altogether.  He will also be using the helps that my dd has been using.

 

Having said all that, I still like A Beka for math - I think it's a pretty thorough math curriculum and I like the constant built-in review.  I just find the presentation or practice of some concepts needs "tweaking" according to your kids' learning strengths.  Much the same could be said of any curriculum, I would think.

 

Good luck!

 

PS: Something else I've tried/am trying for my dd8 - I've bought some of the MUS videos and blocks so I can add some different manipulatives - and a different, more visual way of thinking about things - to the concepts she struggles with.  Might be something to think about - some Cuisenaire rods or something similar could help a lot in understanding the addition/subtraction concepts.

[letsplaymath]

If your son is enjoying ABeka, let him keep using it. But when your girls react so strongly, that is a warning, like when your hand hurts if you get it too near a flame: change course because there's danger ahead.

 

Several ideas to keep your girls from getting burned:

• Definitely check out Education Unboxed. Excellent stuff there!
• Also check out Moebius Noodles for rich ideas to deepen all three kids' understanding of math.
• Pick up a few living math books the next time you visit the library.
• Read Talking Math with Your Kids to learn how to draw out the math in everyday life.
• And explore my blog about homeschooling math. This post is a good place to start: Tell Me a (Math) Story.

 

[KrissiK]

I'm schooling three right now. Started them all off on A Beka and only one has stuck with it. My oldest is doing Singapore... A Beka bored him. My second is doing MCP.... A Beka just had too many things going on in each lesson. DD is doing A Beka second grade now and is doing fine. Don't feel like every kid has to do the same math program. And I echo the speed drill sentiment. We do the speed drills, just for practice. I have never timed the kids.

[SweetMissMagnolia]

we're using abeka and we don't do the speed drills-my son just freaks out if he's pressured or timed....

[lea1]

We are using Math in Focus and CLE. CLE has speed drills and we don't use them. I have two almost eight year old sons. The one that needs the practice more feels too pressured, cannot not write as fast as he thinks and ends up feeling like he is no good at math because he can not get them all done in one minute. My other soon beats the one minute timer every time which makes him feel great but makes the other son feel even worse.

 

I would recommend that you use games and definitely use the website mentioned above to help you explain it to them in other ways. I was exactly where you were about a year and a half ago and I am so glad that I took the extra time to let my sons work lots of problems with lots of manipulatives and we have used a many different approaches. They have really gotten it down now and are faster each day with math facts like seven plus eight is fifteen. I am amazed at how far they have come and am glad that I slowed down and took the time for them to really get it before starting them on multiplying, which we will be starting soon.

 

It has taken me a while to find what works for use but it was worth my time and effort of trying different approaches. They are really starting to feel good at math now and it is so rewarding. Good luck in finding what works for you and your kids.

[jer2911mom]

Another option for speed drills is to time up and let them try to beat their previous time.  We had to do that with CLE for awhile, then my dd asked to start timing down with the given timeframe.  

 

ETA:  I would supplement Abeka with Singapore and/or MUS.  We are doing MUS one lesson/day for the first couple of months of school (instead of taking a week for each lesson), then Singapore for the remaining months, in addition to our daily CLE work.  MUS/Singapore help reinforce the concepts, and programs like Abeka/CLE help round out the computation skills and automaticity, especially in the early years.

 

HTH,

Kathy

[SilverMoon]

When we used Abeka math many moons ago we used the test and speed drill book daily, but never timed the kids. It was a plain practice drill to them.

 

I'd let all of them use counters when they do math, all this year, no matter what the TM says. Legos, beans, buttons, or blocks.

[Guest]

Echoing everyone else. Sounds like ABeka is a wash for your girls. One thing we like about BJU Math is they explain every concept with manipulatives so the child can understand why the math works. 

 

You could use what you have and explain the concepts ABeka is introducing first with actual objects and then let the kids use those to work problems or you can make the switch to another program that does this for you. Many kids are not ready to make the switch from tangible objects for math to complete abstract so young. {Singapore type programs died painfully here. BJU is a good mix.}

[kbutton]

We are using Rosie's videos at Education Unboxed because of what I've read on this board, and they are wonderful. My younger son loves the rods, and I am considering having my much older son do some of the math fact games on that site. He uses his number sense/mental math strategies to calculate, and the math drills he did with A Beka (in school) just made him resort to counting on his fingers really fast, which is definitely not the goal of the curriculum! We do not use A Beka now that we homeschool. I was taught A Beka all throughout elementary school, but I wish I had been taught more conceptually. Not knowing why something worked undermined my confidence in math even though I was a really good student. I could use A Beka and still teach conceptually, but we opted for a curriculum that makes a conceptual approach easier. I have heard very good things about BJU math and almost went with it myself. We now use Miquon for my younger son and Singapore for the older. The younger one completed Math-U-See Primer first. Best wishes finding a program that works well for you.

[Ruthie in MS]

I started out with A Beka myself and just ditched A Beka math for both dd9 and dd7 3 months ago.  My oldest girl did fine with A Beka most of the time.  We used the speed drills (some days) but we NEVER timed them.  She would get too stressed out.  Although when we got to 3rd grade it became non-visual and all numbers.  BORING!  My oldest and I are very visual and really need them (and manipulatives) to get the concept.  Thanks to the ladies here on the boards (and their suggestions) we have moved on to CLE Math.  It's taken a little while to get used to but I prefer it tons more than A Beka.  Of course, I've had to bridge the gaps between the two curricula but other than that, she is excelling.  

 

My advice: I'd give it a couple more weeks (more or less) and continue to see if your girls will continue to reject the A Beka method.  I would ditch the speed drills altogether or just not time them if you think the girls need the extra practice.  If you think A Beka is beginning to send you in a spiral of mathematical doom then I would suggest studying your girls to find out their learning styles and choose curriculum according to that.  During this time of limbo you can use that time to play math games and read plenty of living math books.  This will also give you the needed time to decide their learning styles and find curricula to match.  Most companies have placement tests in order to place them on the correct level and there are plenty of reviews for just about every math program available to homeschoolers.