MEP for multiple levels?

[Desert Strawberry]

We are having a slow start with MEP. I have one in 3a and one in Reception. I love it. but it feels like a lot for us to do in one sitting. I'm sure this will improve once we get through the holidays/new baby adjustments (I'm due any day with a high risk pregnancy), and we get in the swing of things. 

My concern is with juggling more than one at a time. Two is a lot of work, three ( in a couple of years) feels untenable.

 

How many levels of MEP can one realistically teach at one time? 

 

Is anyone managing three or more at once? 

 

Is the day essentially devoted to teaching math all day long?

 

Is it just me who has this problem?

 

[Sherry in OH]

If lessons are taking too long, set a timer.  When it goes off, finish the current problem.  Start at that point the next day. 

 

I am finding math with ds2  takes less time than it did with ds1.  Part of it is familiarity with the program and part is the child’s personality.  Ds2 is much more independently minded than ds1.   At that level, ds1 did most of his math orally with me scribing.  Ds2 prefers to write his responses.   He is willing to do an entire problem set before I check it. 

 

For ds1, years 1-3 took us 20 to 30 minutes a day.  He needed my attention most of the time. Year 4, he is averaging 45 minutes a day.  But, he does not need my attention the entire time. Ds2 is averaging 20 minutes a day for year 2.  He does not need my attention the entire time.

 

[bayareanative]

I am doing 2 kids, twins, both on MEP Y2. But I do each kid separately except on the days I can convince them to work together.  It was a slow start, but once we sort of got the hang of it, we're now on lesson 60. The lessons take 20-30 min each.  That's doable for me. It's a lot, but I feel like it's so worth it because I see them thinking about math and numbers in new ways.  I'd say hang in there as much as you can.

 

We don't do math every single day, but we do math all year, so it works out.  I'd say we do them 3-4x a week on average. 

[Aras]

It might help to pare down some of the lesson. The curriculum was written for a classroom where a teacher has to deal with students at different levels of understanding.

 

If you look at the top of each lesson plan you will see 3 letter codes: R=revision (review), C= concept?, E=extension. So for example in Year 2- lesson 93, the review is sequences and mental calculation, the main lesson is multiplication and division in context, and extension for the advanced students is the concept of half, fifth and tenth. 

 

If you feel your kids are fine with the concept review, you can skip the review activities. If you feel they are ready for a little challenge, you can do the activities that have "extension" written in the margins next to it. Since it is a spiral curriculum, they will come back around to those extension concepts later, so the extension activities can be skipped also.

 

There are two blogs that helped me a lot when I made the switch from SM to MEP, they might help you too. 

 

http://ohpeacefulday.blogspot.com/search/label/Mathematics

 

http://fisheracademy.blogspot.com/search/label/MEP%20math

 

 

[Miss Tick]

I started checking the worksheet against the "classwork", also. If it was on the worksheet and I didn't anticipate a problem I skipped the class time. Obviously if he ran into a road block I knew where to go!

 

I have three students, but just one in MEP. Even at that I've had to pare down MEP to stay sane.