MEP and Beast Academy questions

[caedmyn]

Is MEP something than can be done independently or is it teacher intensive?

 

How many workbook pages or lessons are in BA 4? We school 4 days/week and I'm trying to figure out if it would fit with our schedule.

 

Also, how many pages of reading are there in an average day with BA? My son is dyslexic and I don't want to overload him with the amount of reading involved. We're using Miquon this year which basically has no instructions at all so any other curriculum ia going to be a big adjustment.

[Xahm]

MEP definitely requires teacher involvement, as there is no instruction to the student on the page. That being said, if a student is capable of staying on task, you could teach, then set the student to the task, then come back for questions. 

I recommend going to Beast Academy's website and looking at their samples. To me it seems like a very manageable amount of reading, a light amount even, but I'm not dealing with dyslexia.

 

My kids are too young to have much experience, but you happened to ask about the 2 curricula we actually use! 

[Miss Tick]

I can't see how old your ds is on my phone. MEP is written teacher intensive, but by 4th grade, after two years of using it, my ds did most of the worksheets independently, although when he got stuck it would sometimes take me a bit of work to figure out what they wanted and when they had started covering the topic. At the same time he was working BA, and when he finished 4D we moved him to AOPS pre-algebra. BA (available levels) and MEP (through year 5) had set him up well.

 

For you I would lean toward BA which is written to the student. I don't have any experience with dyslexia, but even if you read all of BA out loud it seems like less reading than MEP.

[LMD]

The beast academy practice books have around 100 pages each, iirc. Not all even in difficulty though! A lot of the workbook pages have a written example, and though there are pictures in both books, they do rely on written explanations to teach. I would not expect a dyslexic child to be able to do it alone.

 

From 3rd grade MEP has online workbooks. I can't remember how independent they are. But generally, mep (and most good elementary math) are not fully independent and will require teaching.

Edited November 10, 2017 by LMD

[LMD]

Maybe something like math u see with beast for supplement?

[wendyroo]

One thing we have found with Beast Academy is that the reading could be done in larger chunks and then the workbook worked fairly independently day to day. 

 

My boys read the whole guide book or have it read to them (GAH, I HATE reading aloud graphic novels) as soon as it comes in the mail.  Then they barely look at it as they work through the practice book.  There are short reviews at the top of many of the practice pages to jog their memory about that particular concept if necessary.

 

In your shoes, I might figure out how many practice pages you expect him to cover in the coming week, note what guide pages those correspond to (this is clearly marked on the practice sheets) and then read him that section of the guide over the weekend...it won't be super long, maybe 8-10 pages, but it will include some challenging words like factorial, diabolically, lamentably, divisibility, precipitate, etc (all pulled from a couple pages of 4B which happened to be sitting next to my desk).  Then, over the week he can work through the practice pages fairly independently, and if he wants to review some of the guide book then it will already be familiar.

 

Wendy

[daijobu]

I like reading BA out loud.  I want to ensure that the students are doing the problems at each stop sign like it asks them to.  I also want to write out the expressions and equations as we read it and do the computations alongside the math beasts illustrated.

 

I also like doing the pirate voice.  

[JIN MOUSA]

I like reading BA out loud.  I want to ensure that the students are doing the problems at each stop sign like it asks them to.  I also want to write out the expressions and equations as we read it and do the computations alongside the math beasts illustrated.

 

I also like doing the pirate voice.  

 

+1 on the pirate voice