Singapore Math textbooks

[Betameculia]

I will be starting LHFHG with my two sons ages nearly 7 and nearly 6, but we will be doing the basics component of Beyond alongside. For math so far we have been using Abeka Arithmetic 1 which I have been happy with overall. I am however thinking of using Singapore Math with my older boy because, unlike my younger son, he does not require the same extensive review provided by Abeka's spiral approach. Also, I think the two boys would be better off doing separate programs.

My oldest boy would place in Singapore 2A, so I would be using either the alternative Math schedule in Beyond or possibly using the Math schedule as set out in Bigger (I don't mind buying the Bigger program already as we will be doing it further down the track and, living in Australia, it makes more sense to buy in advance because of postage costs).

What I would like to know is, why the alternative math program for Beyond requires the Singapore textbooks as well as the workbooks, but the Math program in Bigger only requires the Singapore workbooks. I started Singapore with my oldest boy about a year and a half ago and did not like the separate textbook-workbook arrangement, so would prefer only to have the workbooks and not use the textbook as per Bigger.

Many thanks,

Annette

[Mommamo]

When you're doing the alternate math schedule in Beyond and LHFHG you need the text books because you don't have Carries awesome activities and lessons for you to do. But if you buy the next guide higher then you have the hands on activities and no longer need the text book for the explanations. Clear as mud?

Really, in my opinion it is so very worth it to have Carrie's activities over the text book. They add ever so much to the lesson. Plus, 2A/2B is the last level that Carrie has activities included for. After that, you do need the textbook no matter what. HTH!

[Betameculia]

When you're doing the alternate math schedule in Beyond and LHFHG you need the text books because you don't have Carries awesome activities and lessons for you to do. But if you buy the next guide higher then you have the hands on activities and no longer need the text book for the explanations. Clear as mud?

That's what I thought.

Are you using or have you used Singapore 3? If so, how do you find it after having used Carrie's lessons for the earlier levels? I assume that it would be easier to implment the text-workbook arrangement at this level because the student is more mature.

Thanks,

Annette

[Mommamo]

I've just used up to 1B so far. I'm thinking that it wouldn't be too hard of a transition since they've had that hands-on basis. You could always still add manipulatives or an abacus or what-not if you think your student needs it. I'm sure someone who has made that transition will chime in.

[Kathleen]

We're using Singapore and are really enjoying it!! I love the way that it makes my kids think and they really understand math in real life. We switched to using Singapore when my oldest was beginning "3rd grade". He had used Saxon so far for math, and while that program is leaps ahead of the public school curriculum, he placed into Singapore 2B after completing Saxon 2. (We actually chose to start with 2A though, because I could see some things that we hadn't covered in Saxon. This was the perfect choice for us! ) So, even though I know that Abeka is advanced in their scope & sequence across the board, I'd use Singapore's placement test for your child just to make sure that you start at the right place! It will make a huge difference!! http://www.singaporemath.com/Placement_Test_s/86.htm

Here is Carrie's reasoning for reccommending Singapore for math. I know that this showed me that it was exactly what I was looking for in a math program!
viewtopic.php?p=431#p431

My oldest is ready now for level 4A in Singapore. We thoroughly enjoyed Carrie's hands-on activities in Beyond to go along with 2A and 2B! They were fun, purposeful, and got him thinking. This past year as we did 3A and 3B, the switch to using the textbook with the workbook has gone just fine. Rather than having the hands-on most days, there are pictorial examples in the text to look through before doing the problems in the workbook (or occasionally textbook). The textbook is what I go through with him - and I view it as my teaching time with him. Then he moves on to do similar problems in the workbook. I think that once the kids have the foundation of the hands-on, it's good to move on to the pictorial examples and more abstact ability to picture the problem in their mind.

Allison - my 5 yo has been able to start out with Singapore in LHFHG this past year. I'm enjoying it from the beginning with her now!

Hopefully that answers some of your questions! If it doesn't feel free to keep asking as the moms here are great about helping!
Kathleen

[my3sons]

We've done Singapore from the start (other than 1 year with a different program) and been very pleased with the results! HOD's hands-on activities paired with the Singapore workbooks made math concrete and complete. By the time we'd finished 2B, we were ready to give up the hands-on, as it was easy at that point to do things mentally and picture the hands-on things we used to do. The transition to 3A with no hands-on was an easy one. My oldest is in 4B and thriving, and my middle is in 2A and doing so well too. I can see him following the same progression as my oldest did. I agree the Singapore placement test is accurate and good to do if you didn't start out with Singapore. I also think it's worthwhile to have whatever HOD guide you need to have the hands-on activities if dc place in any level from 2B on down. HTH!

In Christ,
Julie

[Tabitha]

We used Horizons, then Saxon for our oldest. We briefly tried Singapore with her before going to Saxon. We did TT5 this past year and will be using TT6 this fall (plan to start in the summer). She just needs that visual, and for now TT is working for her so we are sticking with it.

My middle started with Saxon K (or was it 1)...and we stopped half way through. I just didn't like it. She did well, but with 3 kids, it was too time intensive. We moved over to Singapore and she did just fine! I felt like we were doing the same thing in less time.

My middle is now finishing 2B with Beyond, and I plan to buy the 2B (or whatever level it is) of their intensive/extra practice and word problems to do over the summer. I am thinking of buy these extra books from here on out. I need dh to do some schooling with them from time to time and these will be great for that. Perhaps I'd just get the extra practice one. I decide this summer once we've done them at the 2B level.

I look forward to moving onto 3A/B with her in the fall, and am glad to hear that transitioning over to using just the textbook has went well for other. We've done all the Beyond activities for Singapore, and actually toward the end there got to be some that she just didn't want to do...so we didn't.

I do think, too, that with the variety of things in the younger HOD guides for Singapore activities, that one could very well fall back on any of those activities and apply that concept to the newer lesson being learned, if it was needed. We've been provided with a wonderful framework, and with a little creativity can adapt them.

[Betameculia]

Thank you everyone for your replies! They have been so helpful in clarifying thoughts I had about Singapore Math. It makes a lot of sense the way in which SM has been incorporated into the program - very mama friendly and child friendly! I think I will switch my oldest boy into Singapore 2A when he finishes with Abeka 1 and perhaps use Abeka 2 with him for revision purposes. I am a little worried about Singapore's 'lack of review' mastery style - not that my boy needs that much review, he's one of those 'tell me once and don't tell me again' kids (he really does remember) - but the little at a time method of the spiral approach has still worked very well with him. There are times when we have hit a brick wall with some concepts in a more step by step program (hitting subtraction in Miquon math is a good example) and there has been no way round. Moving on to the next topic won't work because it builds on the topic he didn't understand and doing more of the topic he has just mastered is pointless and boring for him. With a spiral program, on the other hand, there's more room for manouevre. If he doesn't get something, there are other things to do that keep him interested and confident, and gradually the understanding of the once difficult concept is overcome.

What do you do when you hit a brick wall with a mastery style program such as Singapore?

Annette

[cocomimilily]

I have the same concerns as we are considering switching from Abeka to Singapore. I am a little nervous about not having the built in review/spiral approach....I'd love to hear more peoples responses.

[Carrie]

Annette,

The interesting thing about Singapore is that it does do concepts in a layered approach (layering one concept sequentially on top of the other by using understanding gained from one concept to help kiddos understand the next layer). However, after the section of that particular topic is done (getting more difficult as kiddos move through it), the next section moves onto a different topic and allows kiddos a breather from the hard work and rigor of where the previous topic ended. This gives Singapore a wonderful ebb and flow.

It also allows kiddos to have a bit of break from doing a concept to death and allows their minds to really work on the topic on hand, rather than asking them to recall bits and pieces of every topic every day! In my opinion it is what makes Singapore a more CM approach to math, as kiddos live with a topic for a longer period of time until they can really internalize it. But then, they move on to something else, coming back intermittently to revisit the previous topic in review.

Using this method also means that kiddos aren't expected to master every topic the first time it comes around, because they won't be asked to perform it day-in and day-out and be forced to get it right every day (when they may not have been quite ready to be asked to master it yet)! When it comes back around the next year, I often find my kiddos grasping right away something that had been tough for them before, even though we haven't reviewed it to death in between. We don't do any summer review of math either, yet because my kiddos have been taught through Singapore to think mathematically, they haven't lost any ground over the summer. They are still able to think mathematically when school rolls back around. With my oldest son, I always felt the need to drill him in the summer, so he wouldn't forget all the steps to the various types of math problems or forget how to do the computation part. With Singapore, I don't feel that pressure as my kiddos aren't memorizing steps that can be forgotten but are learning to reason and think through a process.

We've also noticed one more bonus with Singapore. In the other math programs I used with my older son, we found that he was often so exhausted by all of the review at the beginning of each math lesson that when it came time to do the hard work of really understanding and learning a new concept, he was already tired before he started! We find Singapore to be shorter bursts of work that really stretch the mind, while utilizing the mind at its peak right from the start of the lesson.

Anyway, these are just a few thoughts I had this evening as I was reflecting back on our school year with Singapore. No math program will be perfect for everyone. We just happen to have found much to love about Singapore at our house. Blessedly, you can use any math program that you desire with your HOD guide, without interrupting the flow of it!

Blessings,
Carrie

[my3sons]

We have found Carrie's comments to be true in our experience with Singapore as well, and I wanted to add one more thing we've noticed. While other math programs drill by separating out math skills, Singapore incorporates many math skills within solving single problems. For instance, other math programs may have 15 problems in a row that work on 3 digit addition with carrying. Then they may have 10 problems that work on subtraction with borrowing, etc. Then, at the end of all of that drill that is quite predictable (and often exhausting), they may end with a story problem or two, which usually, no surprise here, has dc do just what the already were drilled on - i.e 1-2 problems with 3 digit addition with carrying, and 1-2 problems with subtraction with borrowing. This is an example of how dc are not really learning the "why" behind the "how" of doing math sometimes. Singapore, on the other hand, has multiple step problems ALL of the time, and story problems often ARE the problems to be solved - like a whole bunch of them, rather than computational only problems. For example, to solve just one problem in Singapore, students may use bars to set up solving the problem (fractions), ratios to divide the bars (ratios and division), multiplication to solve the unit of the bar, and subtraction to or addition to answer which person/food/etc. each part of the bar represents. So, review of concepts is inherent, even though we can't look at Singapore's table of contents and find "addition of 3 digit numbers" listed periodically; what's more, Singapore's review of concepts has purpose. I just wanted to share that, as it's something I've truly learned to love about Singapore.

In Christ,
Julie

[birchbark]

Since we're kind of comparing math curricula to Singapore here, I thought I'd pop in and ask a question. I'm trying to decide on a math program for next year and have pretty much narrowed it down to Singapore and Math Mammoth. I have read a lot of raves on MM, but since HoD prefers SM, I am wondering if there are any cons to MM that I should consider.

Also, thanks to Carrie and Julie for the comments above. I added them to the sticky thread.

[Carrie]

birchbark,

Honestly, we find that the Singapore method has stood the test of time in continuing to turn out kiddos who can think mathematically in places all around the world. Singapore has continued to test number 1 in the world in math, and their methods are quite different from what we use here in the U.S. Here in the U.S. our math scores continue to be well below what we'd like them to be when compared with the rest of the world. Yet, it seems that the main focus in the U.S. for addressing this concern is to add more of the same type of math, done more often, and at increasingly younger ages.

We find Singapore to be refreshingly different in its design, its approach, and its sequence. It is very systematic in the way it teaches kiddos to think mathematically. So, in our thinking, if you want a different result, then you must do something different than what everyone else is doing. We find Singapore to be that "something different" for us!

Blessings,
Carrie