Has anyone used Ray's arithmetic?

[Luanne]

What level/s did you use and was it user friendly?

I know I am asking a lot of questions tonight. It is just that I am researching a lot of stuff tonight. I appreciate your patience with me.

[St. Theophan Academy]

I use it with 2 kids right now - grades 1st and 3rd - I have gone through the Primary with the 3rd, and we are working on Intellectual. I have liked it, especially for the beginning work with numbers (the first lessons from Primary are wonderful for a real grasp of numbers I think) and the problems as you progress are quite challenging. Some consider the language a bit archaic, but rarely has that been a problem. It is systematic and simple to use, though I do like having the Beechick teachers guide for ideas and a basic schedule.
Things I don't like about it - the main problem I have is that we have currently stopped it to go back to Singapore 2 level to work extra problems in multiplication. My son does not have his times tables down yet, and I am not ready to move on (though we could continue into fractions just fine, I just want to give him a little more time). Also, there are no exercises/lessons for measuring, time or money in the first years, which is not really a big deal, but might bother some. We covered money through our chore system and daily life, and just occasionally do some practice on time and measuring. Anne Marie

[Luanne]

of Ray's Arithmetic?

[OnTheBrink]

The only place I've seen sample pages is at Amazon. They carry a paperback version and you can see inside the book.

[Luanne]

nt

[OnTheBrink]

I've been looking on this site for more info on Ray's and some blessed person (lizzybee?) posted that if you go to google.com and click on "books" you can do a search for it and by golly, you can download a pdf of the entire book! I was able to download Ray's and the answer key! So, do that and you'll have the entire book to look at.

May God bless LizzyBee for posting that into. Truly a life saver!

[rockermom]

I was just wondering if Ray's was primarily word problems. Do children become familiar with equations? Sorry if this sounds dumb, It's early. :o

[OnTheBrink]

I was just wondering if Ray's was primarily word problems. Do children become familiar with equations? Sorry if this sounds dumb, It's early. :o

Yes, there are equations. I downloaded the Practical Math book and there are lots of equations!

[pianoplayer]

We have used Ray's for years (as a stand-alone, not with the more recent guides). The language is archaic in places, as are some of the measures used, although that is easy to update or explain in teaching. The print is quite tiny, which can be an irritation if your eyes are getting old and tired! :p

We did use flashcards to help secure those addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division tables.

I would not really describe Ray's as user friendly. My hubby (a college math major and our family math teacher) has had no problems in using it. I probably would not have found it as easy to use.

Ray's does not use our modern scope and sequence, so it does not necessarily cover certain topics at the grade level one would expect today. This can become an issue if you are required to do yearly standardized testing, as your student may not have done the same math skills as students in a more traditional program. (The Ray's child may well be more advanced in calculations and word problems, but may not have gotten to geometry, metric system, etc.)

We have been very pleased overall. Our kids have both gained excellent facility in word problems, mental calculations, and fractions, and they go into Algebra very well-prepared. If we had known about Singapore when we chose Ray's, we might have leaned in that direction, but who knows.

[hsm]

from chap1 to chap8 Rays online:
http://digital.library.pitt.edu/cgi-bin/t/text/text-idx?idno=00abh8876m;view=toc;c=nietz
no I haven't used it, but I thought this might help someone

reviews and other similar programs, all free can be found at these 2:

http://oldfashionededucation.com/arithmetic_math.htm
http://donpotter.net/math.htm