Thoughts on math mammoth?

[momof4babes]

I have been using singapore standards with my older kids for the last 2 years. My oldest is finishing up 4b and my second oldest is finishing 3b.

 

We have really liked the program, but have had retention issues with my oldest. I have been able to accommodate this by making my own "reviews" for her.

 

I have 2 younger kids that I had intended on using the books with, but I'm worried I won't be able to get replacement workbooks much longer.

I'm also getting frustrated with juggling the text, workbook, and HIG.

I'm looking at MM, but I'm not sure how it stacks up. I read that it is now CCS aligned, should that worry me?

 

Thanks

[bgtw]

We are switching to MM from SM this year, so I have no experience with it yet.  I am switching because my daughter (8 yr old) didn't like the textbook (she actually said, "I don't want the colored pages, I just like the black and white ones so I can do it and get it done.")  I homeschool through a charter in CA and the curriculum coordinator said that without the textbook there isn't enough review for mastery with SM.  I think my daughter had mild retention issues with it because we so often skipped a lot of the textbook. Don't know if your experience was similar? I was always creating my own reviews for her, as well.  I know some people supplement with the SM extra practice and/or word problems books, but honestly, I didn't want more books.  I've looked at the MM book and, while it looks a little busier on the page, I love that it's all one text (lesson and problems) and it isn't necessarily recommended that you have your child do all the problems if they can achieve mastery by doing fewer.  

 

I actually really like the CC standards for math (at least for the younger grades; I have a 5 yr old going into K and an 8 yr old going into 3rd) as compared to the prior CA standards.  I think SM is pretty aligned as well, and I've heard a lot that MM and SM are pretty similar in that regard.

 

Good luck!

[ktgrok]

It has excellent teaching, and is easy to use, BUT...retention was not good when we used it. I loved it, thought it was going well, but he would forget stuff. There just wasn't enough review. For kids like that we like CLE or Teaching Textbooks. Both have lots of constant review every day of previously learned topics. 

[bgtw]

Oh, and I recently got Math Minutes for review as well.  It has super simple, clean pages and is relatively inexpensive and is very "open and go".  I don't do them as timed pages though.

[Aurelia]

We had major retention issues with MM. I never tried Singapore, so I don't know how it would compare. I found CLE was the best for retention. You can supplement with Singapore word problems if you're worried about mathematical thinking, though I haven't experienced a problem with it.

[OneStepAtATime]

MM is a great program but as with anything else not all kids do well with it.  Mine didn't.  I still use it for supplementation sometimes but for long-term retention we switched to CLE.  Sooooo much easier to teach, too.

[purpleowl]

I have not noticed any retention problems with MM for my daughter (she started with 2A and is on 3B now).  She has needed extra practice for developing automaticity with multiplication facts, but she has no problem remembering what multiplication is and how it works.  So even if it takes a while as she's working on the automaticity, she is still able to figure out an answer because she has retained the concept.  Obviously what works for one kid may not work for another, but for us, this does work. :)

 

Regarding the Common Core Standards, I'm not sure why that would be a concern.  You have the freedom to look at the curriculum and judge it based on whether you believe it teaches math well, in a way that will work for your child / your family.  Some Common Core aligned materials will be good and some bad, just like some non-aligned will be good and some bad.

[umsami]

We've really enjoyed Math Mammoth.  The first year I used it, I printed out a chapter at a time.  Last year, I went and had part A (and then part B) printed and spiral bound.  

 

I haven't had issues with math retention, but DS1 is very math-oriented and it comes easy to him.   DS2 and DD have only used it on and off, but we are doing more this summer.  I gave them the year end test for their grade, and am going over areas where they did not do as well.  

[Bluegoat]

We've just switched to MM from Singapore.  We haven't done a lot yet, but so far we are finding it works better for us.  Not juggling books is great.  My daughter finds the explanations it gives about what the purpose of particular exercises are very helpful.  She also seems to like the way they fit together - she told me last week she found the pages she did fun, because they made sense. 

 

I think if practice alone was an issue I would not worry too much - since the program is so low cost supplementing practice on a few things like that wouldn't be a problem.

[fourisenough]

I adore MM. I buy the printed books and add to it Simple Solutions Common Core Math for a bit of daily, spiral review. SS takes 10 minutes and is done entirely independently (including checking answers and making corrections). My DD10 didn't need the spiral review until we got in the 5th grade level, but at that point there are so many things to keep in her head at the same time that a little review was necessary to keep her completely fluent. 

[Syllieann]

It sounds like mm is what you want. There are unit reviews and cumulative reviews already made. Further review is embedded in the word problems. For most kids, I think the practice and review in mm work texts should be totally sufficient for the concepts. Some may need to drill facts separately, or prefer games or other fact practice to the mm worksheets. We don't need as much practice on the conceptual, or such small increments as is usually provided. We often cross out some, as recommended by the author. IMO this has different psychological effect on the child than taking a program with less review and adding things to it when the child begins to struggle.

[hjordan423]

We love MM!!  It explains concepts in several different ways and provides plenty of practice for those who need it.  My dd even loves.  :)

[momof4babes]

Is the program as strong as Singapore?

I guess I'm nervous to switch things up, singapore is all we have used.

[IsabelC]

I love MM because it's thorough, everything is explicit with no need to figure out what is happening,  and it's super easy to teach. For us there are a few minor drawbacks. First, it's not attractive to look at. The pages sometimes tend to be 'busy', with cluttered visuals and insufficient space for to work their answers unless they have tiny, neat handwriting. Second, in some parts she goes into overkill with the 'baby steps' approach, turning a simple concept into a 5 step process that takes 10 pages. Of course it's easy to skip problems - and occasionally whole lessons - but some children can find the look of it daunting. Finally, it is strongly mastery oriented, which doesn't work for all kids. It does addition and subtraction to death, not introducing multiplication until the middle of grade three, when kids are expected to suddenly learn all their times tables at once. (Ms. 6 decided to start learning tables before she even got to 'concept of multiplication' in the book.) I work around this by alternating the chapters a bit, so if there's a long chapter on one operation, we'll intersperse bits of geometry or whatever is coming up, so that each kid is working on two different chapters at any given time.

[ByGrace3]

We have used MM since grade 1. Several times I was tempted to switch programs and was concerned several times during the last few years about retention. (Topics like money, clocks, and measuring were a struggle when they went so long without seeing them). However, we continued and honestly, I am very glad I did. Now that dd has seen many of those topics year after year, each time we come to them she remembers more and it's not the complete "start over" feel I had the earlier years. I do think we will add some problems from those topics here and there from the MM grade review books. 

 

I almost switched this year-- in fact ordered all of the CLE math for the next grade for both kids. Then I got dd's scores from the Stanford 10. She scored in the 90-92% for all of the math sections and problem solving. This is a kid who is not naturally "mathy." After the kids starting CLE, I can see how the spiral would help some children greatly, however the problem solving, and depth of conceptual understanding is definitely more significant in MM. Sticking with it has been worth it and we we will continue to use it. 

[purpleowl]

It does addition and subtraction to death, not introducing multiplication until the middle of grade three, when kids are expected to suddenly learn all their times tables at once. (Ms. 6 decided to start learning tables before she even got to 'concept of multiplication' in the book.) 

I wonder if you have a different edition than I do?  In what I have, the final chapter of 2B is "Introduction to Multiplication," and then in 3A, chapter 2 is "Multiplication Concept" and then the multiplication tables are in chapter 3.

[Syllieann]

I wonder if you have a different edition than I do? In what I have, the final chapter of 2B is "Introduction to Multiplication," and then in 3A, chapter 2 is "Multiplication Concept" and then the multiplication tables are in chapter 3.

Wondering about this too.

 

I have the latest version, cc aligned, and multiplication is in 2b on mine. Maybe the older version is different.

[Hwin]

Oh it's like my marriage. I'm committed to it but sometimes I wonder what it's thinking.

 

We've done levels 2-5 and will be doing 6 in the fall. I think it is a great program but I don't think it will help with retention. 

 

In order to move more slowly through each concept, I overlap chapters. 2 pages of fractions, 1 page of bar graphs. That kind of thing. I have also done entire chapters over, one page per day, when the concepts didn't gel.

 

 

[Hwin]

Wondering about this too.

 

I have the latest version, cc aligned, and multiplication is in 2b on mine. Maybe the older version is different.

 

I have version 3.0 and multiplication is in 2B.

 

I did lose my original files and they sent me a new set, though, so I can tell you versions are just different enough to get me wildly confused. Now I have my MM saved in 5 different places.

[SnMomof7]

We had a stopover at MM after leaving MUS because of retention issues.

 

It was like pulling teeth to get DD to do two pages. Very cramped design. It just wasn't easy for us to get done.

 

We moved to CLE and are going into our fourth year. We are very happy.

[TheApprentice]

My youngest son had retention issues with this program. He definitely needed more review. We had to switch to Saxon 7/6 and he had great success this past year with it. It went well 3rd through 4th, he continued in 5th, but I could see it was not working. So he made the switch at 6th grade.

[IsabelC]

I wonder if you have a different edition than I do?  In what I have, the final chapter of 2B is "Introduction to Multiplication," and then in 3A, chapter 2 is "Multiplication Concept" and then the multiplication tables are in chapter 3.

 

Oh Sorry, yes! That comment was about the old version. I have the new version, but I didn't want to change the kids mid-grade so Ms. 10 was the last child to move onto the new version after she finished the old 3B.

[scrappyhappymama]

I've been using Math Mammoth for about 5 years now.  My oldest has finished it, my next is in level 4, next is finishing up level 2, and next is starting level 1.  

 

I think it is a fabulous program.

 

We came to Math Mammoth after I ran into issues with "just memorize the algorithm" in Saxon 3 with my oldest.  I did some research on math curroculums, mostly here on the forums, read Knowing and Teaching Elementary Mathematics, and knew I wanted to switch.  I was leaning toward Singapore, but was put off by all the books and parts involved to just cover one year well.  Math Mammoth was recommended to me and we gave it a shot.  I ended up starting my son back in level 1, since there were so many concepts in level 1 and 2 that he had not yet covered through Saxon 3.  He did double work for a year or two to catch up.  

 

Math Mammoth is easy to implement, intuitive for my kids, both the naturally mathy ones and the not so math-inclined.  I love how the concepts are taught from so many different perspectives.  If one does not gel with the student, no problem, another perspective will be in the next section.  They are not drilled to death, but the math facts are learned naturally, without a lot of extra drilling.  It's been wonderful for our family.

 

The price is excellent too, especially if you have multiple children who will be cycling through. 

 

We've used it since before it was aligned with CC.  She did not change the material at all, but simply moved some units from one grade to others, to align with the common presentation of material.  So the move of the formal introduction of multiplication from 3 to 2.  

 

Which brings to mind another benefit of the program.  Math facts are introduced conceptually much sooner than they are formally.  Building blocks for multiplication are throughout the first two levels.  SO much so, that my boys start figuring it out on their own, and are already learning their multiplication tables before it's ever introduced in a multiplication chapter.  Same for division and fractions and algebra.  It makes the new topics so much less daunting when the student feels like they already understand the basics.