What do you look for in a math curriculum?

Question

When looking at curricula for K-2 math, what kinds of things do you look for?

Do you like one that is more hands-on or more workbook and drill oriented?

Do you ever use literature in your math programs?

Answer 1

My son picks up on math extremely quickly (at 10, he's beyond me in math and science), so I look for something that challenges him but allows him to move through at a self-paced speed.  He doesn't need tons of repetition so I tend to move more toward the programs that explain the concept, show it on a TV or computer screen, allow the kids to work with it, and then allow for varying levels of repetition.  

I found Math U See to be far superior to Saxon for him - with Saxon, the spiral approach didn't give him enough time on one concept to really master it, and the jumping around (at least that's what he saw it as) frustrated him to the point he actually lost all of his math facts.  Odd, for a child that loves math!  I got him the elementary and middle school volumes of Math U See and let him go...he finished all of them within 2 years with very little help from me, aced all of them, and is now in algebra.

The point is, each child has different needs and different learning styles; the poster above me has a child who did very well in Saxon, while mine hated it like the plague.  Mine did very well in MUS, while hers might not have liked the approach.  Honestly, I ended up taking mine to convention when he was 7 or 8 and had him go through a lot of the curriculum booths...I let him have a say in picking his curriculum.  Each time, he picked the ones that really appealed to him and would cause him to learn, and when our school year got to the "I don't want to do this anymore" phase, he stuck with it because he picked it.  He's going on 11 and I still allow him to do this - and he commonly picks curriculum that not only would I not normally pick, but that is more advanced than what I would pick.

I would say to talk with your child, on their level, about what they would like to do.  Some kids go nuts over flashcards and think they're the coolest thing ever, while others just want a workbook page each day, and still others need literature and games.  Look for his reactions - you'll know when you've shown him the right program.

Hope that helps!

Answer 2

When my babies were in K-2, we played a lot of board games where they had to count the spaces, games where they built things (Lego's, etc), counted the cans in the cabinet (my son loved to pull them all out and count them when he was little), piggy bank activities (rule in my house is if you find money in denominations less than $1, it's yours), play store, and allow them to have a store budget and list of items that need to be purchased with that budget (this is a $5 budget for this age group and the items were normally cereal or fruit juices to keep them interested). As far as formal education, we did not use a lot of worksheets, but I did do a lot of oral drills because my children like those. Now that they are older, I use Math-U-See and they love it. This curriculum can be used for K-2, but I didn't know about it until 2 years ago. In my opinion, hands on is essential for early math so that the children can grasp the concepts easier.

Answer 3

Before looking for a curriculum, I would find out my child's learning style.  This is very important with young kids.  Some kids are visual/tactile learners - they need to see and touch the math problem.  For these kids, a program like http://www.mathusee.com/ can be very helpful.  It is also helpful for kids who might need a decent amount of repetition. For those who need less, many folks go withhttp://saxonpublishers.harcourtachieve.c... or http://www.singaporemath.com/

There are other differences between these programs, such as the way the levels are divided...some by grade, others by function.  

It is also perfectly fine to switch programs is one does not work for you.

Be well.

Answer 4

I teach chemistry and physics in our local and our online co-op and have home schooled for 16 years now (4 children of my own). That has given me a long range view of math and I work with kids that have come from a variety of math programs.

I haven't found the perfect math curriculum, so I have always added what I felt a curriculum lacked. Some have to be added to more than others do. Saxon has definitely proven itself to be the strongest contender yet. My 8th grader's IOWA test scores came back a few weeks ago. He scored in the 96th percentile on math. Though we have explored a few different math programs that he has used, Saxon is the one we always come back to and what he has been using the most consistently.

Why Saxon? Though many kids don't like the repetition, I find it is effective to have the continuous review. That is what drew me to Saxon in the first place. I remember as a high school student doing fine on each daily lesson where you do 30 problems all of the type you learned about that day, but at the 2 week or more mark when we would have a cumulative test, I would have forgotten everything but the last few lessons we covered. My kids don't have to deal with that issue because every lesson is a blend of the lessons previously covered. Every lesson is a cumulative one.

What I end up adding to round out what I feel is lacking:

One thing that I find none of the math texts doing to adequately help kids prepare for science is seeing how to string multiple equations together. I am not talking about situations where you always use equation a, then b, then c. In high school level and higher math, the science problems you will be asked to find something, but to get there you have to see what you have and select among several equations to find several missing variables before you ever even use the equation that would directly solve for what you are looking for. I have yet to find a math text that does that. The kids basically have to learn it on the fly once they hit chemistry and physics.

Only a rare few math curriculums actually assist kids in connecting real world data with patterns that can translate to generating math statements to describe and predict based on those patterns. Saxon does to a degree. Cognitive Tutor goes even further. I find that it helps the kids quite a lot to keep bringing the math back to the real world. Let them collect data, plot the data, see the pattern (linear, quadratic, etc.) and then derive a math statement that they then can use to know what will happen given any new data just using the math.

For instance, my daughter was getting old enough to drive herself 25 miles into town to do youth events throughout the week at church. Insurance on a teen driver is expensive but so is gas. If she drove, it would be a trip where the car goes in to town once and is driven home once. If I took her, it meant a trip in to town once to drop her off and then again to pick her up. Twice as much gas but no insurance needed if we waited until she was 18 and the rates go down. Which one makes more sense economically given varying average numbers of youth events per month. Most math programs do not adequately give the kids tools to be able to analyze this real world computation. Giving the kids tools to think a problem like this through with efficiency is what I feel I have to add to the math curriculum. Cognitive Tutor is the only math program I have found that majors on skills like this, but it is lacking in many more areas than it is helping on this one, so I have stuck with Saxon and added what was needed.