opinion of teaching textbooks and math u see

We use Math U See and love it.  It explains things really well and doesn’t rush them through.  Each lesson has six worksheets.  The first 3 focus entirely on the new concept and the last 3 also review the previously taught concepts.  There is also an extra worksheet in the test booklet if needed and you can go online and do reviews or print extra worksheets if your child hasn’t grasped the concept yet.  If your child grasps the concept with only a couple worksheets, there is no need to do them all.  Give them the test and move on.  The child can progress through their book at their own speed.  I have found it to be gentle and enjoyable.  Math is my DD favorite subject.

I have one DD who is doing the alpha book this year.  She is doing great.  She get 100% on most of her tests.  There has been an occasional 95% and that was mostly from not paying enough attention to what she was supposed to be doing.  At the rate she is moving through it, she will finish up the book at the end of our school year.

My other DD started the year in the Primer.  She has worked her way through it.  I have had her do every page just to keep her from progressing to fast and she is a bit young but wants to do it.  She would do 3-6 worksheets a day just because she wanted to.  She finished it last week and started the Alpha yesterday.

I don’t know about teaching textbooks, but we really like MUS.  My son just started Gamma, and he really enjoys his math.  I don’t care for Math and have learned a lot just from teaching him!  It definitely wants you to have a subject mastered before moving on so no pressure to rush through it.  I personally don’t like the Primer, it seems too advanced in some subjects and then they are almost exactly repeated in the Alpha level.  Before I started schooling I researched different math programs and MUS sounded like a great fit for our family, I will be curious to see if it works for my daughter who will start alpha this fall.  I also remember reviews that said it’s not the best program in the upper levels, so I was looking at changing to Life of Fred possibly for upper level math. 

My dd likes TT 3, it got her out of her math rut, but the only problems is that there isn’t enough “mastery” to it; not enough practice problems before moving onto the next topic or word problems. She needs more than what they provide. So she’s been doing Math Mammoth. It’s colorful, is independant and gives her a variety of ways to learn a concept and she enjoys it.

She’ll finish TT3 with MM support, but I won’t get it again, at least at the elementary years. I can’t afford it like this every year when MM is more complete and challenging and extremely less in cost.

Rachel

Love MUS here too. The biggest difference is that TT is a spiral program. Where MUS is a mastery based program.

You can go to TT website and let your child try some samples. (I looked at it, because we have several friends that use it and love it.) But it was not for us. Way too much review. My son got frustrated with it. MUS teaches a concept then you practice mastering that concept then there are a couple of review areas during the week. TT has a lot of review.

In fact in the demo we did out of over 68 problems only 4 were on the subject of the lecture all the others were on reviewing concepts.

You can also go to MUS site and watch a Demo video that shows you how it works.  We have used it for 5 years, and it has given us a great foundation. (Some people say it is behind -but usually that is because they are spiral programs that introduce concepts early, but do not actually have kids master them.) Where as MR. Demme doesn’t do that. When he introduces the concept, he has children master the understanding before proceeding. Then he buildes upon that -sort of like building a house from the foundation up.

Just wanted to add that I would not suggest TT. Dd10 used it this year for 5th grade and did not learn a thing. She aced the program and finished in plenty of time, her days were only about 20 minutes long and she didn’t complain aboput math anyomre. However, I had her do a few extra practice sheets since she was finishing so early and began to realize that she was way behind. I had her take several placement test, Math Mammoth, CLE, Saxon and she placed into the end of 4th grade level in them all. 4th grade was were we used Abeka and switched to TT at the beginning of 5th grade. I think if you a willing to do the program with them, so you know where they are, and supply plenty of extra pratice and review it might would work. It just seemed awful expensive for me to have to do all of that. She is working through Math Mammoth now trying to get caught back up. She enjoys it and is really learning. Hope this helps your decision.