Singapore Earlybird Math: What comes next?

[MitchellMom]

My daughter will finish Singapore Earlybird Math (Standards Edition) in a couple of weeks. What comest next? I know this might seem like an obvious question - after all, the Singapore site seems to suggest jumping into Primary Math 1A and 1B. Is this the logical next step? I thought I read in a thread a while back that there was an extra step between Earlybird Kindergarten and Primary 1A and 1B.

(If I'm wrong, that's fine! I will be glad to jump into Primary 1A! But I appreciate your advice! :) )

[Karen in CO]

In singapore, kids start school later than in the US. The problem with moving a K aged kid into 1A is that you will quickly hit a conceptual wall.

I don't do formal math with that age so I have nothing to recommend. I have RS A and Miquon waiting for my dd when she is older. Right now she is working through the BJU K math book so that she has mathy pages to do on the days she wants to join her sister at the school table.

[Laura Corin]

We went to Primary 1A at K age, but we took it very slowly: it was our K maths for the whole year, with lots of other activities added in. We then went on to 1B/2A for first grade, 2B/3A for second grade, etc.

Laura

[Sara R]

1A moves pretty quickly. With my little ones, I've done "Activities with the AL Abacus" (unscripted Right Start) until they have addition and subtraction down. Then we zoom through Singapore 1A.

[CMama]

This is kind of OT, but I'm finding that using Saxon Math is an excellent spine supplemented by Singapore Earlybird. So far they seem to overlap each other quite nicely. We're currently in Saxon Math K supplemented with Earlybird 1B. We'll most likely complete both by the end of the month and continue to progress in each curriculum this way...

Saxon Math 1 supplemented w/Earlybird 2A & 2B
Saxon Math 2 supplemented w/Primary Math 1A & 1B
etc.

Perhaps something like this may work for you.

BTW, I do also plan on dabbling in to a bit of Miquon Math in the future as well, most likely during the summer.

[Colleen in SEVA]

The US Edition of Earlybird has 1A/B and 2 A/B, but I believe the standards edition only has an A & B -- so next would be the Primary Math 1A.

:)

[Ali in OR]

There is no Singapore product between Earlybird and Primary 1A. Having gone through 1A with a first grader before, I chose not to start it early for my youngest when she finished Earlybird last spring at age 5. There is a big leap between the expectations in Earlybird and the expectations in Singapore. You need to be able to hold numbers in your head and manipulate them quickly and easily in your head. For my youngest, we have been doing Horizons K this year. Next year, her first grade year, she will do Singapore 1A/1B and supplement with some Horizons which is our standard operating mode with my 3rd grader. At your dc's age, I would go to some other product for awhile and wait on 1A. Could be Horizons, Miquon, Right Start, Saxon, etc. Many of us like combining more than one program anyway, and this is a good time to jump to something else for awhile.

[kailuamom]

We went from EB to 1A, which went pretty smoothly. With dd, we went straight into 1A and continued with the books in order, but she started Singapore later. My ds finished the EB books when he was not yet 5, and is now in 1B. We have had to really slow down -- the stuff in 1B gets difficult pretty quickly. I started supplementing with all kinds of other stuff, worksheets online, etc. We have actually decided to jump into MUS Alpha -- he wants to try something new and I want to cement the place value/facts. But, we may go back to Singapore later -- we really liked the program.

[MitchellMom]

In singapore, kids start school later than in the US. The problem with moving a K aged kid into 1A is that you will quickly hit a conceptual wall.

I don't do formal math with that age so I have nothing to recommend. I have RS A and Miquon waiting for my dd when she is older. Right now she is working through the BJU K math book so that she has mathy pages to do on the days she wants to join her sister at the school table.

I wondered about this; I looked at some of the activities in the 1A/1B books and it looked like a bit of a leap from Earlybird.

The US Edition of Earlybird has 1A/B and 2 A/B, but I believe the standards edition only has an A & B -- so next would be the Primary Math 1A.

:)

Thank you! This is what I was talking about!!! So my next step is primary math 1A, even if I wait a while before moving to it?...

Thank you everyone who has answered so far - you've been great!

[lovelearnandlive]

Jessie,

I'm about halfways through Earlybird B right now with my dd. I've been supplementing it with Singapore's Power Math K workbook. Here's a link (http://www.singaporemath.com/Power_Math_K_Workbook_for_Kindergarten_p/pwmk.htm). It's a bit more advanced than the Earlybird workbooks. I've used it topically: we did Earlybird A first and then I found the corresponding topics in the Power Math workbook and did those. After we are done with Earlybird B we'll finish what's left of the Power Math workbook and then move onto Primary Math 1A.

I'm *hoping* that this workbook will bridge the gap I've heard of between the Earlybird and 1A curricula. I ordered 1A last week and am excited to have a look. :D

[MitchellMom]

Jessie,

I'm about halfways through Earlybird B right now with my dd. I've been supplementing it with Singapore's Power Math K workbook. Here's a link (http://www.singaporemath.com/Power_Math_K_Workbook_for_Kindergarten_p/pwmk.htm). It's a bit more advanced than the Earlybird workbooks. I've used it topically: we did Earlybird A first and then I found the corresponding topics in the Power Math workbook and did those. After we are done with Earlybird B we'll finish what's left of the Power Math workbook and then move onto Primary Math 1A.

I'm *hoping* that this workbook will bridge the gap I've heard of between the Earlybird and 1A curricula. I ordered 1A last week and am excited to have a look. :D

Thanks so much! Does it require a teacher guide or include teaching instruction with it?

[lovelearnandlive]

Thanks so much! Does it require a teacher guide or include teaching instruction with it?

It doesn't require a teaching guide (I don't even think there is one), and everything is pretty straight forward. You don't use any manipulatives, everything is done right in the workbook and there are answers in the back.

A couple other things: the workbook is in black and white, but a lot of the exercises have the student color things in so it don't get too boring. :001_smile: Also, it introduces concepts that aren't included in the Earlybird curriculum, including: making tallies, number ordering, ordinal numbers, and some addition and subtraction word problems. It has a cumulative review at the end of each unit, we only did the problems that I thought dd could use the extra practice on (otherwise you would be doing a LOT of review).

For us, it's worked really well to reinforce what she learned in the Earlybird workbooks, and add a level of difficulty to the concepts. :)

[MitchellMom]

It doesn't require a teaching guide (I don't even think there is one), and everything is pretty straight forward. You don't use any manipulatives, everything is done right in the workbook and there are answers in the back.

A couple other things: the workbook is in black and white, but a lot of the exercises have the student color things in so it don't get too boring. :001_smile: Also, it introduces concepts that aren't included in the Earlybird curriculum, including: making tallies, number ordering, ordinal numbers, and some addition and subtraction word problems. It has a cumulative review at the end of each unit, we only did the problems that I thought dd could use the extra practice on (otherwise you would be doing a LOT of review).

For us, it's worked really well to reinforce what she learned in the Earlybird workbooks, and add a level of difficulty to the concepts. :)


Great! Will it work for a child who's been using the Standards Earlybird edition?...

[matroyshka]

All my kids zoomed through EB (it was US edition), and started 1A when still in K. But, we took it very slowly and took a whole calendar year to get through 1A, and then finished up with 1B by the end of 1st.

[Alice]

I got the Power Math K book mentioned earlier. It was useful but we both got kind of bored with it. I took about 1/2 year (from Sept-Dec) to just spend a lot of time doing number games and things to make sure he really understood numbers. We played a lot of games and did a lot of Dot-to-Dots. I found a great Kumon dot-to-dot with numbers up to 150 which he loved. We worked on skip counting by 5's and 10's.

Then recently I started 1A. I'm just going really slow to make sure he understand the concept before moving on. Still playing a lot of games. Ds is 5 1/2 and doing well.

[DinoMom]

I started with Singapore 1A, but DD finds it too challenging. I switched to RightStart A, and then after a whole year we return to SM 1A again, and this time she whisked past by herself like reading a colorful storybook to the middle of the book where she needs me to guide her work. We always fall back to RS A when SM did not work. I think it works best for us to use both RS and SM.

[MitchellMom]

This is wonderful information so far - thanks!