Math advice needed

[sixpence1978]

My DS7 is doing 2nd grade math right now. He doesn't know all of it, but it moves so slowly for him. For example, it will have an entire chapter on adding or subtracting 2-digit numbers, when he could learn it in 1 lesson.

My DH wants to move him quickly through the material and then have him doing 3rd grade level math probably for the 2nd half of the year. I've looked at the 3rd grade book and think that it is something that he could tackle now with the review that is at the beginning.

So, I guess my question is, which would be the better course of action...
1.) moving him quickly through the 2nd grade book and then advancing him into 3rd grade
2.) go ahead and start 3rd grade but if he is struggling take it slower or go back to the 2nd grade book for that topic.

BTW, we are using BJU for math. It isn't a perfect fit for us, but I haven't found anything that I like better. I'm not a fan of spiral, and Singapore just doesn't really do it for me.

[In The Great White North]

He doesn't know all of it, but it moves so slowly for him.

You don't really have to do every bit of every lesson. Explain what's new, have him do enough to show you he gets it, then move on. The goal is mastery, not boredom.

Is there an end of year test for the 2nd grade book? That could tell you very quickly what he doesn't know. Then you could look at the beginning of the 3rd grade book and see if it's covered there. If it is, start the 3rd grade book; if it isn't, teach him just what he needs, then start the 3rd grade book.

I wouldn't go through the whole 2nd grade book (quickly or not) unless he really bombs the end of year test.

[WendyK]

I don't do everything in every chapter. If he seems to get it right away I have him do a few problems and then move on. We buzz through very quickly.

[OhElizabeth]

We use the BJU math, and my dd has always been a bit ahead in math too. (Nothing like some kids here, but some, hehe.) Are you using the new edition or previous edition of the BJU math? The new edition, which I think is available for grade 2 and maybe grade 3, has a cd-rom in the tm that has all the extra practice sheets. Does yours have that? I ask because on that cd-rom you have the pages that teachers in a school using BJU math would assign as homework (what used to be called Spring Into Action, not sure if they call them that in the new edition), Reviews (spiral review and fact drill), and Stretch Your Mind (challenging application problems, way out of the box, way fun). If you're not doing those pages, you're not doing all the BJU math.

I hear you on your dc learning the concepts faster, and my dd was very similar. In fact, I used RightStart through level D because it was so strong conceptually and then switched her over to BJU. I'll tell you though, just to warn you, what can come back to bite you is fact speed and overall proficiency. I'm not saying you can't move him up or shouldn't, but I'm saying that if you DO and his facts aren't fast, it's going to get frustrating. That's why the amount of practice is there. And if he's proficient enough to zoom ahead, he should be going very quickly. In other words, if the material is easy for him conceptually AND he's done enough practice to get proficient, he could go faster but still do the work. I'd look for some sign of that.

Are you still in the review lessons of the book (the first 6 weeks or more) or have you gotten into new material? With my dd, the geometry, time, and measurement pages, anything spatial, tend to be very easy and fun. They're usually interspersed as chapters in the back. To speed things up, what you can do, assuming he's proficient enough to go faster, is do your regular computation lesson (student worktext plus Spring plus Stretch) and then let him do just the student worktext page from a chapter with the spatial stuff. There's no need for him to do the homework pages for the spatial stuff, not if it happens to be exceptionally easy and something that comes naturally for him. So in essence you're combining or doubling lessons, but you're not doubling the amount of computation per day, which could become wearisome, at least in our house.

Was that clear as mud? LOL

You could jump to gr 3, but I really think it can come back to bite you with fact speed, endurance, etc. I'd rather double up and move forward, just me. And do check out those Stretch pages. They are SO much fun for my dd. A dc who is especially capable needs that extra challenge, and it will make the BJU math more fun for him. If you're only doing the student worktext and none of the extra stuff, you're not doing all they intend for you to. Even the Spring pages, which my teacher friend in a cs assigns as homework, tend to be a bit more challenging than the student worktext. So if that's all he's been doing, he's really not doing it all, kwim? But don't rush ahead without building speed and proficiency, that's my two cents. It came back to bite us really hard.

[sixpence1978]

We are using the 3rd edition and some of the extra challenges. Those are fun.

Right now we are doing the time chapter, which he needed some work on. He knows his facts quite well. He is very fast with addition. Subtraction still needs a little bit more speed, but we are working on it. He always gets it right though.

He already know how to add with renaming (or carrying) up to 4 digits. We haven't yet done subtraction with borrowing, but I know that it is something that he will pick up quickly on. His forte is actually computation. He picks up on it quickly. The spacial concepts are his harder portions.

Looking ahead in the 2nd grade book, what he hasn't really learned would be subtraction with borrowing, intro to multiplication and division (though division is just briefly covered), and a little bit more complexity with geometry (vertices and such).

I always felt that during 1st grade, it was moving slow. Now 2nd grade seems the same way. IMO, he knows about 50% of the material already. About 1/3-1/2 of the remaining material are topics that he picks up on easily and I was wondering if just the review section at the beginning of 3rd grade would cover that.

I really don't feel like I am pushing him at all to advance. I actually put him back into 1st grade grammar because that is not his strong suit and he was struggling early on. But math is his thing. He sees patterns to it all the time that I think are really neat (my DH and I are both math-y people too). Right now I am giving him each chapter test and seeing if there is a portion of it that he is struggling with. We go over that and skip the rest.

[ChristineMM]

It sounds like BJU is not a perfect fit. However since you have it already you might as well use it. I would suggest teaching the concept in the lesson and keeping the lesson time to whatever is working for your child, i.e. does he burn out after 20 minutes, 30? Stick to the lesson time by the minutes and stop when the time is up rather than focus on the lesson. In other words don't burn your son out by doing the lesson if it takes too long and is too much repetition. I hope I am making sense...

Then when he is getting all perfect work and gets the concept, just go forward however many pages you have to skip to get to the next new concept. Then pick it up from there.

There is this thing that is so funny when I see it in other people but I am still guilty of it. It is when we feel our children should do every single problem or every single page in a workbook or text. If they get it, move on, especially with a topic like math. You can't exactly skip forward on history or science, right? KWIM?

I had just changed from my much loved MUS to Singapore for my 3rd grader and am finding Singapore way too easy for him. I am having him fly through the text and not do the workbook for the extra practice. We should be done with the entire A (half year book) in less than a week. That would mean it took my son 4 weeks to do what is supposed to be a half year curriculum. I had used the placement test but IMO it put him back too far. Groan. Money wasted. Oh well. The reason I'm sticking it out and not just chucking the entire book is that it is covering two topic that MUS had not taught him yet, metric system and fractions. So I'm considering this review for now and he is just learning two new concepts out of the whole book. Then we'll move on....

[Karin]

I had just changed from my much loved MUS to Singapore for my 3rd grader and am finding Singapore way too easy for him. I am having him fly through the text and not do the workbook for the extra practice. We should be done with the entire A (half year book) in less than a week. That would mean it took my son 4 weeks to do what is supposed to be a half year curriculum. I had used the placement test but IMO it put him back too far. Groan. Money wasted. Oh well. The reason I'm sticking it out and not just chucking the entire book is that it is covering two topic that MUS had not taught him yet, metric system and fractions. So I'm considering this review for now and he is just learning two new concepts out of the whole book. Then we'll move on....

Ah, this can definitely happen when you first start Singapore Math or, for mathy kids, if you stick only to the text & work books. You might wish to use the textbook along with the Intensive Practice and/or Challenging Word Problems rather than the text book and the workbook. There is a big difference in the word problems in CWP--and if you only use that with the text there are both practice problems and challenging word problems in case you ever need the practice.

Also, my now 10 yo whipped through the earlier levels very quickly, but slowed down later. In part because we used 2 programs. The first couple of levels are very easy, but build the basics.

[OhElizabeth]

Sixpence, did you ever decide what to do? I don't think you should skip the 2nd grade book, because he hasn't yet covered major concepts in it. If I could suggest, I think working daily, every day, even through the summer, is the easiest way to get ahead in math without skipping or frustrating the student. You can't tell how he'll react when he gets into multi-digit subtraction with borrowing, so you want to give him the chance to ramp up to that slowly, not dump him in a higher level book that covers it briefly and moves on. Also, I'm not sure the 3rd grade is available yet in the new edition, is it? It would be a bummer to buy before that becomes available.

You should also understand that BJU intentionally keeps the pace very measured in these early grades. In other words they WANT it to seem easy for the student, because this is the age when foundational understanding is laid of the concepts and when attitudes are formed. So when you look at test scores of BJU users vs. others at www.hightestscores.com you see some textbooks do perform ahead early on. But BJU takes a slow and steady wins the race approach. So you have to balance going ahead with getting faster at his facts. Does he WANT to do more math daily? Certainly he could double up on lessons if he wanted, doing half of the work for the next lesson. But if he's not strong spatially or hasn't covered concepts, I wouldn't just whiz him forward, me personally. I would have him do the lessons every single day and let it add up over time to where he gets ahead. I'm saying it's normal for a normal child to find the BJU math pleasant and comfortable at this stage of the game. To me, just my take from what you're saying, that sounds like what is happening. He's not asking for more math or saying he's bored or looking ahead for more challenging sections in the book. Those would be signs of needing to move ahead. In a situation like that, I would toss the text pages and assign just the homework and challenge pages, going back and doing the text pages where he doesn't already know the concept. But that's for an aggressive dc who is asking for more, making leaps in the concepts, begging for more math. My dd used to BEG me to make up math problems for her. We would be working on one concept and she'd bring up something harder and ask me to teach it to her. When I've taught her concepts, we've always gone directly to more complicated situations (not just subtraction, but 4 digit subtraction, not just division, but large division problems). EVEN SO, I make her go back and do all the easy pages, because the more they do, the faster they get.

Do you realize you could have him do math 6 days a week? Like I'm saying, it doesn't take much to get ahead of the standard text place, just by working through the summer and working diligently. Doesn't even require skipping or combining lessons, because a standard textbook is meant to have off so much time in the summer.

[sixpence1978]

OhElizabeth,

We have decided to stick with BJU2 for now. Once we started the time chapter, he was having trouble so we slowed down and worked or where he was struggling.

He would never ask to move ahead. He likes things to be easy and not require too much thought. But the few times I have given him a harder problem to do and he gets it quite easily...he really beams with a sense of accomplishment.

Today we are starting the 2-digit addition chapter which we will speed through because he knows how to do all of it already.

I figured that if a topic is easy, we would skip a bunch and just do mostly the end of the chapter reviews. And then we would slow down for those chapters that he struggles though. Whenever we finish with the book, we'll advance him to the next grade and skip or speed through the review chapters. That way, he gets a good foundation without it boring him.

He also likes that all the pages that he is skipping, I've been putting in a pile for him to grab one if he is bored. He actually likes to do worksheets in his free time.

I really do like BJU math, it is still my favorite overall. I just wish that is were as advanced as Horizons computationally and that it included a few more pattern-finding questions (like Saxon uses).

I have debated switching to Horizons for him but I just am not a huge fan of spiral learning for math...maybe it would be better for him though...I hate indecision :)

[OhElizabeth]

Sounds like a plan! Couple suggestions on how to kick it up while still in the 2nd grade book.

-use more advanced or longer problems during your instructional time. Nothing says you have to present it with 2 digit addition, just because the lesson shows that. Go ahead and do 4 digit addition.
-skip all calculator use. Some of the pages allow for calculator use, but I never allow my dd to use one for them. Seems pointless to me, when it's simple stuff she could do mentally or that she OUGHT to be doing easily and quickly on her own. I have no problem with calculators for demonstrating patterns and things, but I don't like them as a computation shortcut, not at this age.
-add in some math games and more challenging application things to kick up your time. He might enjoy the SM computer games (haven't played them, but they sound fun), Zoombinis (loved in our house!), Fritz & Chesster (chess for kids, crazy fun), etc. With the RS Card Games Kit you get hundreds of games that cover a variety of levels of challenge. You could take the time thing he is struggling with and play games, starting with easy ones and progressing into more challenging ones. In fact, I would highly recommend this for him.

Don't be afraid to let things be easy. If it were too easy, he'd be bored and asking for a change. Don't feel like you have to keep up with the Joneses, make things hard, or anything else. What purpose would it serve if his math were HARD right now? I mean truly, what purpose? He's enjoying it, building a good foundation, and feels confident moving forward. By the 4th grade book he'll be doing longer division, something that really gets some kids. I think division and fractions are where kids start to dislike math if they're going to. There's no need to rush to get there and have him develop negative attitudes. I would just totally watch him and set your own feelings aside. If HE wants more or responds positively to more work, give him a little more. But don't be afraid to just keep a normal, steady pace.

[Scuff]

Something else to consider with BJU 3rd edition. (the reason we switched from it) Eventually you are going to run out of books and need to switch to the 2nd edition or something else. They've been coming out about 1/year. If you check the school side of the website they come out a little faster than the HS side. But still, they're only out through 3rd grade right now (and not even on the HS side) So if you move him through quickly, he's going to run out of books.

My ds was right on the edge too. I didn't realize it was a new edition when I bought it. He wizzed right through the K5 book and there was nothing to do next. I switched to the Ray's workbooks, which bored him to death and didn't teach much that he didn't know already. By mid 1st grade, when I wanted to switch, BJU had the 1st grade book out. But it wasn't on the site. I called and the lady was very helpful, said they'd just come out and put the order through. He wizzed through that in a few months, but then the 2nd grade hadn't come out. (I watched and it did come out the middle of the next year) Ect, ect, ect.

Anyway, all that to say that if your ds moves through things quickly you're going to hit the wall of when these books are coming out.

[MyCalling]

Please check out Math on the Level (http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/www.mathonthelevel.com). My ds7 is thriving on it and in less than two months he's mastered 20+ concepts in grade levels as high as 5th! To give you perspective, he was in Singapore 1A/B last year. It allows me to teach him at his pace and what concepts he's ready for in any order we want. There is nothing as custom as MotL and it's perfect for advanced children.

Plus their 5-A-Day review method makes sure what he learns sticks so I don't have to worry about rushing him through and finding out months down the road he's forgotten it all. I really can't praise it enough. Did I mention it only takes us 15-20 minutes a day with NO workbooks?!

[KinderSafari]

I think the number one thing is to allow yourself to work at his pace. That's what's great about homeschooling!

There's no rule that says you have to do every page.
Or every problem.

If my kids say they understand a page and don't want to do all the problems, I pick a few for them and if they get them all right, they can skip the other problems.

Sometimes we'll even skip a few lessons.

A lot of math is repeating what they learned the year before and building on it. Some of my kids learn lessons forever, and don't really need the review the next year. Others of my kids need the daily review!

[KinderSafari]

It's good to set goals, but be realistic too!

If he's struggling, it's more important to slow down and re-set your school year's goals.

It's better to get it right the first time around and get things cemented in place to build on for the future.

[sharon333]

That is great advice. That would the be worst thing to do is to push to hard.

[sixpence1978]

We are slowing down when needed and speeding up when he is ready as well.

Right now, he can solve really tough equations (for 2nd grade), but his speed is somewhat slow. So we are working on drilling the facts a bit more.

He also struggled through the time chapter and is now struggling a bit through the measurement chapter. We're taking it slow. I think math frustrates him if it isn't in an equation form :tongue_smilie:

[Testimony]

I know that children can advance in mathematics and other skills very easily. I feel awkward skipping stuff when it comes to math. If my child knows the first two or three problems, I would not skip and go to the next sections. I do every single problem to make sure that my son understands it. This is just my opinion and the way I do it.

I feel that math is a subject where problems need to be mastered. The only way that I know that they are being mastered is if we keep doing the problems different ways. I cannot image doing Singapore Math with the textbook only. You need both the textbook and the workbook minimal to work through problems. The textbook only explains what the concepts are. You need the workbook to have the child work through the problems.

I don't use BJU math, but I would not just skip unless my child took a test and tested out of the level. This is truly my opinion. You can do whatever you want in homeschooling. For me, certain areas I would not take a chance on skipping.

Blessings in your homeschooling journey!

Sincerely,
Karen
www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimon7

[MyCalling]

Please check out Math on the Level (http://www.mathonthelevel.com/).Oops! Fixed the link.

[LisaK in VA]

I know that children can advance in mathematics and other skills very easily. I feel awkward skipping stuff when it comes to math. If my child knows the first two or three problems, I would not skip and go to the next sections. I do every single problem to make sure that my son understands it. This is just my opinion and the way I do it.

Depending upon the curriculum, and the number of problems, I would agree. However, there are some curriculums which have so many problems (35-50), that I don't feel a need to do every single one. I merely ensure my son does a variety. Additionally, since we have switched to a more "mastery" approach, the concept may take us two days on the intial learning, and then the continuations my children fly through.

For example, once my dd learned how to carry and borrow, say from the ones to the tens or from the tens to the ones, just making the numbers "bigger" wasn't an issue. Some spiral/incremental work doesn't usually give enough practice in the one lesson to cement the concept.

I will also agree with the "You need the Singapore workbook AND textbook" -- the textbook, in general, isn't enough practice in my opinion.

[Karin]

I know that children can advance in mathematics and other skills very easily. I feel awkward skipping stuff when it comes to math. If my child knows the first two or three problems, I would not skip and go to the next sections. I do every single problem to make sure that my son understands it. This is just my opinion and the way I do it.

I feel that math is a subject where problems need to be mastered. The only way that I know that they are being mastered is if we keep doing the problems different ways. I cannot image doing Singapore Math with the textbook only. Blessings in your homeschooling journey!

Sincerely,
Karen
www.homeschoolblogger.com/testimon7

This is one of the beautiful things about homeschooling--you do what you believe is best for your children. I had to modifiy this view greatly for my eldest who has a mind like a steel trap for many mathematical things, and didn't require this in many areas for mastery, particularly in grades 1-6 because she did Saxon Math for 3-6 and there was way too much repetition for her. With my 10 yo, we only do the text book as needed, but she does MUS as well, so sometimes has already mastered a process when she gets to it in SM and can just do the workbook. For my ds, we do all the workbook problems, but not all the textbook ones. However, he's also doing CWP which I find gives him practice much better suited to him.

I also had to totally rethink how dc learn math facts, since my older two are visual spatial learners for whom drill caused more harm than good. And yes, they both know their math facts inside out and backwards now, but they learned it as they did it. Ds does more rote memory work with this than they did due to his different learning style.