Tree House Academy Posted October 8, 2008 Share Posted October 8, 2008 Someone, please tell my why I didn't listen to the wise woman who pm'd me before I bought Calvert math back in the summer and recommended Singapore? My son LOVES this math, I LOVE this math. It is making our days SO MUCH BETTER! My oldest now looks forward to math rather than dreading it, and I don't find it hard to teach at all...there was a learning curve with the planning, but now that we are over that, we are loving it. Thanks so much to everyone who helped us with this choice! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MgoBlue Posted October 8, 2008 Share Posted October 8, 2008 We're doing singapore here with my 7 yr old 2nd grade dd as well. She "gets" every concept...well- we're only to adding and subtracting 3 & 4 digits w/borrowing (wrong word!)...but I'm wondering if I'm giving her too many problems per day. I'm trying to keep up with the mental math in the lessons and that's 30 problems in addition to the regular exercise and the couple of textbook pages which she prefers to do herself. She's bored if I go through it with her! She's making silly mistakes in adding instead of subtracting for a few of the problems and I'm thinking this is because perhaps I'm giving her too much? I don't mean to hijack your thread...just we love singapore here as well...and I'm hoping that we're not missing important stuff that may be on standardized tests at some point. Guess I shouldn't really worry too much about that, eh? Paula Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mom-ninja. Posted October 8, 2008 Share Posted October 8, 2008 It's good when you find something that fits. It makes everyone so happy. :) Funny, how different things work for different people. We tried Singapore and both ds and I did not like it. So now we use RightStart and we both love it. Yea, for you and your ds for loving the same program. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mandamom Posted October 8, 2008 Share Posted October 8, 2008 (edited) We're doing singapore here with my 7 yr old 2nd grade dd as well. She "gets" every concept...well- we're only to adding and subtracting 3 & 4 digits w/borrowing (wrong word!)...but I'm wondering if I'm giving her too many problems per day. I'm trying to keep up with the mental math in the lessons and that's 30 problems in addition to the regular exercise and the couple of textbook pages which she prefers to do herself. She's bored if I go through it with her! She's making silly mistakes in adding instead of subtracting for a few of the problems and I'm thinking this is because perhaps I'm giving her too much? I don't mean to hijack your thread...just we love singapore here as well...and I'm hoping that we're not missing important stuff that may be on standardized tests at some point. Guess I shouldn't really worry too much about that, eh?Paula First make sure that she knows all of her math facts.Secondly, make sure it isn't a maturity issue. Maybe break up your math class so that she's doing the mental math at one time and the rest of the problems at a later time in the day. My last thought is, instead of sitting with her and going over all of the problems, circling the ones that are wrong and giving them back to her to correct. Start having her learn that she needs to look over her own work before turning it in. Those are my suggestions, I hope you find something that works. Edited October 9, 2008 by Mandamom Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MgoBlue Posted October 8, 2008 Share Posted October 8, 2008 Thanks Mandamom...This is all new...and math can be frustrating! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Susan in KY Posted October 9, 2008 Share Posted October 9, 2008 Funny, how different things work for different people. We tried Singapore and both ds and I did not like it. So now we use RightStart and we both love it. Just wanted to say that I have a friend who does RightStart for grades K-3, and starts with Singapore in grade 4. She has found it works wonderfully, and I can see where it would. I wish I'd done it that way, because if you start a child who is not particularly mathematically inclined too young on Singapore (I think before age 7) that it can backfire a bit. In Singapore itself 1st graders are 7 years old, and it makes a big difference. I love Singapore, though, and glad we chose it now. If I had it to do all over again, I'd do RS first and switch over like my friend. All that to say: if you find you need a change later, don't be shy about trying Singapore again! :001_smile: FWIW, Susan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
herbalgirl Posted October 9, 2008 Share Posted October 9, 2008 That's awesome you found something that clicked with your child! I know it is such a great feeling when that happens. We're using Singapore, but find my son has trouble with some of the concepts. We're taking it very slow at this point. :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bigdogs29906 Posted October 9, 2008 Share Posted October 9, 2008 We love Singapore too! For some reason it feels like we are moving more slowly through it this year though. Hey it all evens out in the end, right? I'm glad you found something that works. That's (at least) half the battle. Congrats!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matryoshka Posted October 9, 2008 Share Posted October 9, 2008 We're using Singapore, but find my son has trouble with some of the concepts. We're taking it very slow at this point. :) We've used Singapore all along. I almost considered switching to RS when I heard about it - I love the idea, but when I looked at it, I realized it would overwhelm me. I knew it was too teacher-intensive for me - and so much text! (after Singapore, all math programs seem like they have an overwhelming amount of text ;)) - anyhoo, I still just had to have that abacus. I bought it and just the abacus book, and went through all the abacus lessons that corresponded to the Singapore lessons we'd done so far over that summer. I think it really helped cement some of those concepts. Then I used the abacus as our primary manipulative starting with 1A for my younger dd. She's math bright and mostly just gets it, so we hadn't touched it for a long time (we're in 3A now). But then today, the girl finally hit a concept she didn't get instantaneously. I think it stunned her - she began to cry (even though I told her it was no big deal if she didn't get it from the very first example!) Whipped out our trusty abacus and book and did the same lesson that way. We may do a couple more days of it that way before we move on. But anyway, the abacus (okay, and I have a million other manipulatives, but that's the one I love the most) is a great addendum to Singapore. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Camy-7 boybarians 1 lady Posted October 9, 2008 Share Posted October 9, 2008 We have done Singapore from the start. Once I became very paranoid about the lack of drill and rows of problems in the Singapore books, so I gave my son a page of drillwork problems to do. He looked frustrated and hopeless. But what he said made me realize the value of our experience with Singapore: "Mom, if these were all story problems, it wouldn't be so tough!" That amazed me! Let's just say I pitched that drillsheet into the recycle bin double-time. Glad you are enjoying SM. Blessings. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Testimony Posted October 9, 2008 Share Posted October 9, 2008 just we love singapore here as well...and I'm hoping that we're not missing important stuff that may be on standardized tests at some point. Guess I shouldn't really worry too much about that, eh?Paula My older son took the standardized tests last year after three years of Singapore Math. In the computation section, he got a perfect score. In the regular section, he scored in the 96th percentile. I think it all even out in the end. I think that if a child loves math, they will do well no matter what. I am happy for the mom who found Singapore. We love it too! Blessings in your homeschooling journey! Karen http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimony http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/NewJersey Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KarenNC Posted October 9, 2008 Share Posted October 9, 2008 She's making silly mistakes in adding instead of subtracting for a few of the problems and I'm thinking this is because perhaps I'm giving her too much? I don't mean to hijack your thread...just we love singapore here as well...and I'm hoping that we're not missing important stuff that may be on standardized tests at some point. Guess I shouldn't really worry too much about that, eh?Paula Don't worry about the standardized tests at this point, at least not as far as I can see. We have done Singapore (including really very little math drill outside of it) since kindergarten with Earlybird (she is now in 3A, we switched to the Standards edition). Last year, when she was 7 (2nd grade 7th month)and in the middle of 2B, we (for a variety of reasons) tested her with the Iowa 4th grade level and with a streamlined version of the Woodcock Johnson III achievement tests (no specific grade level, normed through at least high school). On the WJIII she tested as 3rd grade 8th month on both math calculation and applied problems. On the Iowa (remember this is a 4th grade level test), she scored 3rd grade 3rd month on estimation and math concepts, 4th grade 6th month on problem solving and data interpretation, 2nd grade 5th month on math computation (I think some of the carelessness was still an issue here), with an overall of 3rd grade 4th month. You can see she would benefit from more drill in speed (which we've been working on). Math is not her strong point, so it's not that she's a math whiz or loves math!:001_smile: We did the out of grade testing based on her levels of reading knowing math was a good bit lower. We also had a real problem last year when she was 7 on making careless mistakes with addition or subtraction (oddly, multiplication and division is easier for her--not sure why). For her, it was primarily simply a lack of paying attention because she didn't see it as important. I started giving her the reviews as tests. This year, since they usually come in pairs, if she makes a satisfactory score on the first one (basically she has to get all the concepts correctly, can lose a few points on computation, but must still have more than 90%), she doesn't have to do the second one. It took only one test where I showed her that in public school she would have failed because of her careless errors and what she could have scored if she had not made them (ie errors where it was computational carelessness rather than not understanding the process). It was the difference between a 95 and a 30 (yes, her careless errors were that bad at that time--this was the first test). Her competitive streak didn't care for that :). Now she may be off by one or two because she made a computational error, but she consistently uses the correct operation at least. Another issue we had for a good while at that age was that she would swap numbers around in subtraction because it was easier than borrowing (for instance in 490 - 36, she would start by saying 6-0 =6). After all, it didn't matter in which order one did it in addition, right;)? That's pretty much resolved itself by now with repeated correction. Now my challenge is more practice with two step word problems. I'm going to try this free site http://www.thinkingblocks.com/ to see if that helps. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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