Minutes of Math per Day

[silver]

A Beast Academy topic where parents were posting how long their student works on BA each day got me wondering. How long do your students do math per day?

 

I allowed selection of multiple options in case you start with one range of minutes at the lower end of the age range and increase to another range of minutes as they hit the end of the age range.

 

 

Include time spent teaching the lesson, drilling math facts, doing work for your main curriculum, doing supplemental work, math games, and reading living math books.

 

 

[purpleowl]

Generally, DD *could* complete her math lessons in 10-20 minutes.  In actuality, though, it depends on how interested she is in the day's lesson, how often her brother is making her giggle, how many times she decides to illustrate the math problems, how often she finds it necessary to correct something her sister says...

[Ethel Mertz]

I couldn't record my vote as the poll wanted answers for all sections. As I have only one kid, who is soon to be 13, I couldn't vote in the other categories. DS does math for 45-60 minutes a day (usually closer to 60 minutes).

[Critterfixer]

Right at an hour. That includes the CLE Speed Drill, Lesson and a page of Key To Fractions.

[MinivanMom]

At our house it's been about:

5-6 yrs: 10-15 min

7-9 yrs: 15-30 min

10 and up: 60+ min (I do try to cut them off at the hour mark, but sometimes they are engaged and want to finish a problem set.)

[Arcadia]

My boys rather do math at 11pm until way past midnight than sleep :p  I gave up counting the hours.

 

ETA:

Kids read the libraries dry of all the living math books the libraries have.

[Dmmetler]

I officially cut her off when she starts seeming frustrated. That's grown from about 15 minutes at age 5 to usually about 90 at age 10 1/2. That doesn't count math just read for fun, but not assigned. (like Life of Fred, Danica McKellar, and those yellow and black X for Dummies books, which she adores for some reason).

[Soror]

My son is a slow worker, dd1 has been pretty quick and dd2 has just started but so far seems to have the strengths of both and the weaknesses of neither. I can't ever remember spending less than an hr with ds for math, he was good at it, even when he struggled with other things so we ran with it, I wanted him to have one thing he excelled at (looking now that wasn't necessarily the best choice but what I thought best at the time). Dd1-8/3rd can easily finish a lesson of Horizons in 30 min or less, she is easily 2x as fast as him, she is no more smart mind you. Now dd2 is 5 and doing k/1st math and we spend 15-20 min I think. I answered based on my girls since ds is on the slow side with his processing speed. So many times I wondered how people could be so fast and we could be so slow now having my daughters I understand, if I had to do it again with a similar kid I'm still not certain how we would work it. I marked ds for 10+, 1hr+ and that is what have scheduled, reality is that we go over about 80% or so I think. I think in the probably 20 or so days we've done school this year he has been at less than an hr once.

[MeaganS]

My oldest is a dawdler and takes an hour or so to do one lesson in CLE (not including speed drills, which we skip). When motivated, she has finished it in a half hour before. My 4 yo probably spends a half hour and does 2 pages of Miquon, she picks one and I pick one, and a lesson in MEP. She really enjoys it though and I would (and do) cut back on any given day if she is getting frustrated. The other day she cried because we weren't doing math that day, so I don't think I'm pushing her too hard. :)

[silver]

I couldn't record my vote as the poll wanted answers for all sections. As I have only one kid, who is soon to be 13, I couldn't vote in the other categories. DS does math for 45-60 minutes a day (usually closer to 60 minutes).

 

You could either select the "I've never homeschool this age" or choose how long he took when he was that age.

[BookMama13]

We do teaching textbooks and each lesson takes about 15-minutes. I usually have each child to two lessons/day (since we don't do it every day), and sometimes more just depending. Or sometimes they have to re-do a lesson!  ;)

[Kerileanne99]

Oh wow. I am totally feeling like dd5 does too much. She can easily push 2 hours per day, not including math reading books she picks up on her own. Never will she want to stop before 45 min-1 hour. And I am ALWAYS ready to stop before she does. But she toggles back and forth between books, so maybe in her mind it is different? She might do some Beast and then want some in the Key to Series, then want to do some on computer, then back to Singapore. I encourage this to slow her down a bit.

 

I don't know how I could change this though, or if I should as she enjoys it...maybe next week she will decide not to do math and devote herself to something else:)

[Farrar]

About 30 minutes from age 5-7, about 45 at age 8-9, about 60 minutes at age 10 and I suspect that will stay the same as they turn 11 very soon.

 

That doesn't include time for math read alouds, math related projects and so forth, which is something that comes and goes in our house.

[cassafraz]

Ours is 30-45 minutes for my 7 year old. Our math lesson and worksheets only take about 30 minutes and then we do 10-20 minutes on reflex math.

[reign]

My 5 year old was done in 20 minutes this year. My 7 & 8 both worked for about 45 minutes.

All three did MM and Dreambox. They are loving the Bedtime math books right now. Who'd have thought math in bed would be so much fun. I wish our libraries had Life of Fred!

[Hobbes]

I haven't used math curriculum until this year, just taught concepts now and then. My 2nd grader tested into MM 2, so I'm interested to see how that goes.

[Btervet]

I picked 30-45 minutes, but I'm not sure how accurate that is. Most days his curriculum based math takes 30-45, which includes a page of MEP, a page or two of Miquon, and a lesson in Rightstart. But some days that can take an hour, and some days like today it took 20 minutes.

 

He also plays with splashmath, dragonbox, dragonbox elements, and Khan Academy. That is usually another 20 minutes or so each day, but could be 2 hours if he gets really into them one day.

[SeaConquest]

45-60 minutes of Singapore or Beast. We basically go until I can tell that he is done. No tears or anything, I can just tell that he is mentally done. But, that does not include time spent playing the Prodigy game, which he does for fun in his spare time. I also didn't count living math books because he also considers those fun. He is 6, and going into 1st, but works a couple levels ahead.

[SnMomof7]

I think 5-7 is too wide a spread. My 5-yo's do maybe 5 minutes. My 7-yo's do around 35.

[silver]

I think 5-7 is too wide a spread. My 5-yo's do maybe 5 minutes. My 7-yo's do around 35.

 

I thought about that, but I also didn't want to have too many questions on the poll. I did let you choose multiple options, so you could choose everything from <5 through 5-15, 15-30, and 30-45 to show that you hit all the time ranges for 5-7.

[Holly]

I schedule 30 minutes of math each day.  My older two (ages 13 and 10) use all of that time (and occasionally they finish up later in the afternoon).  My younger two use less time.  I'd guess 5-10 for the 5yo and 15-20 for the 8yo.  

 

This year I've added Paper Sloyd and Practical Geometry.  Both are hands-on geometry lessons that were used in CM schools.  We spend 15-20 minutes on each of these, once a week.  

[Bree]

My 5 year old does about 20 minutes a day but she's doing Abeka video for that and class is usually that long. If I did it with her it would probably be 5-10 minuets.

My 8 year old does about 15 minutes a day. She loves math and is quick. Probably will be longer this year once we get further in.

10 year old takes about 45 minutes. He hates math :)

[Mommy to monkeys]

I think 5-7 is too wide a spread. My 5-yo's do maybe 5 minutes. My 7-yo's do around 35.

I agree with this. 

As my 5 year old doesn't do ANY math yet, I put in totals for my 7 year old. ;)

7 year old- about 20 minutes

10 year old- about 30-40 minutes 

12 year old- right at an hour

 

All my totals were the most common category. I guess that means I can take a deep breath.

[rzberrymom]

Gosh, it varies so much by the day! Sometimes my 10 year old only does 30 minutes, but then sometimes she does 90 minutes and I practically have to force her to stop.

[abcmommy]

At our house I do not teach a lesson.  We do SM and usually use the workbook only, relying on the text when needed.  This child is 10 and my 3rd.  We just open the lesson and begin and if I see it has something new we refer to the book.  #embarrassing I use the "cheater book" (HIG) for my kids starting in grade 4 for word problems.  They are better at them than I am.

[SilverMoon]

5-7 - I voted for 15-30 minutes. My almost 5yo and I spend about 7-10 minutes counting orally and introducing the new concept (number), how to write it, and such. Then he does a double sided worksheet that takes him ten minutes tops. My 7yo on the other hand does two full Horizons lessons a grade ahead in 30 minutes tops. They're not even in the same playing field. LOL

 

8-10 - I voted 30-45 minutes, but that's an average of all four of my oldest kids for that age range. My current 9.5yo could do two full Horizons lessons in 30 minutes, and still spend time playing around on Alcumus, Khan, Zacarro books, and/or Keys to Alg for another hour. (She starts AoPS in a week or two and this will probably change.)

 

11-13 - I voted 45-60. My older two both did about an hour a day. My current 11.5yo works in AoPS until he's spent. That's usually around 50-60 minutes.