How do you combine math programs?

[musicianmom]

I'm thinking of mixing something in with Math-U-See. How does that work? Would MEP be something good to try? (I like the "free" part, lol.)

[WendyK]

I use Singapore. I wanted to add in the MEP. So each morning we start off with one worksheet in MEP. I tried to start off where it made sense (level wise). Once in awhile we come across a topic that we haven't covered so I either skip it, or we work on it together. Most of the time we just work it out. Nothing has come up so far that I couldn't just quickly explain.

Then we move onto our regular Singapore exercises. At first I thought this would take a lot of time, but it really hasn't.

[Jen in PA]

I use Singapore. I wanted to add in the MEP. So each morning we start off with one worksheet in MEP. I tried to start off where it made sense (level wise). Once in awhile we come across a topic that we haven't covered so I either skip it, or we work on it together. Most of the time we just work it out. Nothing has come up so far that I couldn't just quickly explain.

Then we move onto our regular Singapore exercises. At first I thought this would take a lot of time, but it really hasn't.

This is pretty much what we are doing. At first, we were speeding through MEP because I thought we should back up and start at a lower level. Now dd seems comfortable with both Singapore and MEP, and we do a bit of each on school days. Since I am reinforcing certain concepts, I feel even more free to skip parts of SM that are review. I just aim for a balance between covering the material and challenging dd.

[Mesa]

I have always used 2 math programs....and I have switched from program to program a lot. I was trying to find something, anything that worked and made sense to my son.
We have settled on MUS and Singapore, and we'll stick with these programs.
We do both programs everyday and we do the math game cd rom from singapore as well.
For me these two programs are both quick to teach, with lessons being easy to understand and the worksheets are short and sweet... so they work well together for us.
I like mixing the mastery approach MUS with the out of the box, upper level thinking singapore math provides.

[Amber in AUS]

We will be doing 2 math from July and i am just going to use them side by side. I was thinking of supplementing but that just means more work choosing which pages to use as the supplementary materials and when they are going to fit in. Going to use RS and MEP so i should think MUS and MEP would work well too. MUS didn't work for us sadly.

[Karin]

I just do what comes next with each math program. However, if you do MEP, I wouldn't just do the worksheets--the very best part of it, IMO, is what's in the part the teacher is supposed to do with the child. And this is coming from someone who normally eschews math teacher's manuals.

We do MUS, and initially switched to it as a main math program. It wasn't nearly meaty enough, so we added Singapore Math. I don't bother trying to correlate them. We're recent "converts" to MEP, and I won't bother trying to correlate that, either. What it means is that ds now has 3 math programs plus CWP instead of two. However, if I have my way ;), he'll go into math. If he has his way, he'll fly airliners. Based on his activities & interests now for the past few years, though, he'll become an aeronautical engineer. Of course, he's only 8!

[Aurelia]

We alternate. It took a long time to find RS and I plan to stick with it, although Ariel isn't quite ready for the speed of the B level lessons, so I'm adding Miquon as soon as it gets here. We have used several of the Kumon books in the last year, especially for areas where she was weak, like telling time. I think it works well, it gives her a chance to see how to do things in different ways. The problem is I have to figure out all the ways so I can teach it. :tongue_smilie:

[Mommy2BeautifulGirls]

We're going to be switching to Math Mammoth very soon. If there are any parts of it that I feel need extra teaching and/or practice, or even a different approach, I still have my Saxon 2 manual that I can pull lessons out of to supplement with. We haven't started the new program at all, so I'm not really sure how often I will use Saxon to supplement.

So, I guess I'm really not much help today. :D

[JeanM]

My older son is using both Life of Fred and Singapore math. We are sort of switch back and forth between the two programs. My ds thinks that Life of Fred explains things better. So when we got to percents, he worked through the section of Life of Fred first. Then I had him do the percents stuff in Singapore, to make sure he had enough practice. There is also some stuff that is only in one or the other, so he gets exposed to more stuff this way.

I don't know if this helps you, but it is how we have been doing math this year.

Jean