Honest reviews of Mcruffy everything

[Janeway]

I like the way Mcruffy looks online. I would love honest reviews and details. Such as..my child is very creative and loved it. My child is not very creative and loved it, Did not like it because it took too much teacher time/had too many manipulative/seemed forced, etc.

 

Thanks!

 

I am looking at everything, phonics, handwriting, spelling, math for lower grades.

[FawnsFunnyFarm]

OK, we love McRuffy math. We have used it for years. My daughter struggled with it because it moved pretty fast. She is artsy, not academic. We moved her to Teaching Textbooks because its a very similar style but moves much slower. Even with struggling in McRuffy 1st (she had done fine in McRuffy K), she tested barely into TT4, firmly into 3 and since she was a 3rd grader, decided she couldn't do math and therefore hated it we went with 3. She does well now. My boys have all gotten McRuffy, never struggled. They are both much more numbers oriented naturally. MDS did move to TT a year ago. He wanted the independence and so did I lol. We have all enjoyed the games and the hands on. I love that the lessons do not take long.

 

The language arts, well that's a different story for us. We tried the kindy level. It was just way more than I wanted for us at that time. Now, I kind of regret that. Its a solid program, and works well for many. We just wanted a lighter language arts path. We never revisited it.

 

Science, we did half of kindy. We liked it quite a bit, I honestly don't recall why we dropped it. I think I wanted more living books.

[Guest]

Well, we call it Fluffy McRuffy... colorful and fun but not much there. The books are just stupid. The difficulty level never matches up so some is too hard and some too easy. The math seems tossed together. Too many toys, not enough drills.

 

BUT you may LOVE it! Give it a go...see what you think. Then post back and share.

[historically accurate]

My youngest uses McRuffy Math. It works very, very well for her. It's colorful & fun, but actually it is a solid math program. She loves those days when she gets a math game and it's the only math program that reminds me to get out the geoboard/tangrams/pattern blocks and actually use them - very helpful for me. It doesn't require a lot of my brain power since it is somewhat scripted, which is good, since I'm teaching 2 other levels of math (everyone is in their own program).

 

She did use Kindergarten Language Arts. I didn't like it, and it didn't really work for her - took us 2 years to get to the middle of the book - she just wasn't ready, and then she just took off with reading and we didn't need the rest of the program. So that was a bust here.

 

ETA: We have used K, 1 & 2 level math, and K only in Language Arts. 

Edited May 5, 2016 by beckyjo

[FawnsFunnyFarm]

Well, we call it Fluffy McRuffy... colorful and fun but not much there. The books are just stupid. The difficulty level never matches up so some is too hard and some too easy. The math seems tossed together. Too many toys, not enough drills.

 

BUT you may LOVE it! Give it a go...see what you think. Then post back and share.

I am going to assume you didn't use above kindy math, and that you probably didn't go far with that. In 1st grade, they have 2 timed tests every week, oral drills where you throw numbers at the kid and they have to write the answers doing the math in their heads, and lots of thinking skills. It does feel light and fluffy, but it really is far from it. Edited May 5, 2016 by FawnsFunnyFarm

[RootAnn]

We only use K math. My boys are both hands on, craftsy, and prefer-moving-to-sitting-still with a workbook. I have found it to be great as a K math with the understanding that I never do anything exactly as written.

 

The boys love the games. (I find that most, but not all of the games, are more busy than useful for what they are intended to teach. I do really like the race track for getting them to practice number recognition and names. Mine have needed the practice.)

 

In general, mine like the tangrams and dot patterns. They don't care for the pattern cards.

 

I have built more review in since mine need to go over shape names, skip counting, names of the day's of the week, etc. I adjust some of the lessons to where my kid is at.

 

I might have stuck with them had I found them back with my first or second kid. But I already have the upper levels of our other math, so we switch over. (The first boy was sad to not do 'fun'math anymore, so we would sometimes pull out a game to help with the transition.)

 

I spend less than 30 minutes total per lesson even with extra review built in. I have all the manipulatives in a small tote with the TM and workbook so it is grab and go.

[Ewe Mama]

McRuffy's Dynamic Phonics Learning Book (available at Rainbow) was our all-time favorite phonics program. I tried so many programs and this one suited us to a T. It is bare bones, but it involved having the kids make their own readers so they were doing copy work while they were learning to read. My kids loved making their books every week and illustrating them. We also bought the readers that went along with the newer McRuffy Phonics levels because my kids thought they were hysterically funny. I have great memories of using it and wish I still had more little ones to use it with. Sniff, sniff.

 

I have no experience with their Language Arts, Spelling, or Handwriting programs.

 

I ordered and returned one of the science levels (I think it was 1st grade) because I didn't care for its style and layout. I could just tell it wouldn't work well for us.

 

We have used k-3 math with some of our kids. It worked best for our "do it and get it done" children and not so well with our artistic, day dreamers after the 1st grade level. It moves quickly. Mathy kids who "get it" do great, but not-as-mathy kids can get frustrated by not having enough review to completely grasp the topic.

 

Honestly, I would pick one or two of the programs to try first before using the entire line of products. If overdone, I would be concerned that McRuffy could get really old, really quickly. We loved having one special McRuffy lesson per day, but I don't think they would have thought it was as awesome if he had been around all day long.

[Vida Winter]

I did the phonics with one child one time and she loved it. It was a lot of work, though! Lots of cutting and pasting. If you're up to doing that, go for it!

[Janeway]

Vida... I am not up for a bunch of cutting and pasting. We tried a science program that was all that long ago and my hand hurt from all the cutting. I would hate it if it is at all similar.

[foronemoresoul]

I have the LA with spelling and handwriting for 3rd grade. I used part of it for my son. He liked the stories. They held his interest enough that he didn't complain about reading them to me and often finished them on his own. The rest was too advanced and too much writing for him. I set it aside. It would have worked well for my daughters who enjoyed writing and neat little workbooks at that age but it was a poor choice for my wiggly son who has no patience for sitting still and writing.

 

HTH

[Guest]

I am going to assume you didn't use above kindy math, and that you probably didn't go far with that. In 1st grade, they have 2 timed tests every week, oral drills where you throw numbers at the kid and they have to write the answers doing the math in their heads, and lots of thinking skills. It does feel light and fluffy, but it really is far from it.

We did K, 1st and 2 nd. The timed tests are a joke at least compared to CLE. Glad it worked for you though! Thank goodness we have so many choices!

[threeofakind]

We used 1-4th grade math.  We loved it- just her style- games, manipulative, oral exercises and drills and in color!   :001_smile:   However, in 4th grade something happened- it felt like there was too much too soon?  Some people suggested that is 4th grade math in general.  I am not sure- we switched for 5th grade, and she does not love it as much (TT).  But, math was her favorite because she loved the program and it worked for us.  We tried the 1st grade Language Arts- it was too much- she did enjoy the books and so we did stick with those, but we dropped the workbooks.  It felt too much like busy work I guess?

 

My son tried 3rd grade math and TT as well- he did not do well with either.  He was a kid who did better with MUS- he wanted to practice one skill at a time and master it.  He also tried the LA at 3rd grade- he managed through a couple months, but again we dropped that for him too.

 

I know someone who has used only McRuffy for 2nd and 3rd grade- math, LA and science.  Her daughter loves it- and so does mom, it is very well laid out and clear for them.  She likes that it is a 'traditional' program and her daughter is actually very creative- loves to draw, etc.  

 

Like someone suggested, maybe try 1 or 2 subjects and see how your child responds!  Good luck!  ;)

[BatmansWife]

We loved the K math.  Not sure why we didn't stick with it (honestly, I can't for the life of me even remember what we did for math in 1st or why we switched from McRuffy).  

 

We liked the K phonics a lot, and tried the 1st grade phonics.  There is a huge leap between K and 1st as far as spelling.  You can see the spelling words in the samples.  1st was just too hard for my daughter at that time.  

 

We tried the K Science too.  It's cute...but not much there.  I thought the Science was too spendy for what you got.  

 

I really do like McRuffy though.  It's cute and colorful...and I think it's very nice quality.  

[Nana Judy]

Well you can't say its light and fluffy in 4th grade Color Math.  It has probability trees which are usually introduced 7th grade and used in calculus in high school.  as an ex 6th and 5th grade math teacher, I had never seen those, so I am learning right along with my grandson who I homeschool due to his physical issues.  He's profoundly gifted and is halfway thru Saxon 7th grade, and has tested at post high school levels on Stanford and been in 99.99% for Mathletics last 3 years and in 7th grade on Kahns, but I went to 4th grade as a review when school started early this year to do light review, since summer was daily games only, but I'm finding that it is as advanced as Saxon 7th grade,  so please do NOT say light and fluffy.  And all those manipulative work:  they build brain connections to keep a child using both hemispheres of their brain.  We tend to go left side at age 10 and then lose creativity, but with this Color Math, there is no chance of that.  I've even had to go out and buy more manipulatives after previewing what we will find in future lessons, we are in lesson 54 right now.  We usually do 2 lessons a day and still not doing a full hour like we did in Saxon.  We will go back to Saxon when thru with this just because its served us well.  He's 9.