Math Curriculum

I meant to post something about this over the summer and I completely forgot!  Yesterday I received an email from a fellow mom that I would consider a veteran homeschooler, she writes:

"Amanda, I have been struggling over math for this year.  I have dragged my feet.  I must make a decision today to get something here asap.  I am considering Math U See and Teaching Textbooks  (for algebra 1).  Do you have any input?  Or can you recommend someone that might have some advice??"

Here was my response, I hope it might be of use to someone!

So, I have a friend that used Math U See for several years. Her son really struggled with math in part because of the curriculum.  She asked me to help tutor him for a little while and what I found in his pre-algebra and algebra CD was rather disappointing because they were teaching him tricks to get the right answer without the why and the how.  Bob Jones uses spiral learning, so seeing lessons covered one time and move on is not how we have ever learned - the MUS curriculum may linger on a topic for a week or so, but then they move on and the student did  not retain what they had learned. 
I would not use this curriculum for this reason.  Because there is limited written instruction, they do not cover topics in a way that encourages a thorough understanding.   I have seen a young man really struggle with it.  My friend switched to Teaching Textbooks, and her son is not planning to go to college, so it worked out for them.

I have two other friends who have used Teaching Textbooks.  Their complaints were similar to my experience with MUS, the information is learned and forgotten because of the manner of teaching.  Mastery is never achieved.  I had one friend's son in my Physical Science class 2 years ago and we were working on 7th grade fractions with the physics portion of this course.  Her son was very upset that he could not complete these problems and embarrassed in class. I talked to her  about it and she said she had used TT and felt she had fallen farther behind.  
The other friend posted her review of TT online a few weeks ago on her Facebook page.  While her kids like the easiness of the text and the lack of repetitive 'busy work' she said the same thing - the kids never achieved mastery of the topic and so she was not happy with the curriculum because she had to constantly add to it.  Without spiral learning, I don't know that mastery can be achieved in any subject. 

So, we use Saxon Math with the DIVE CD.  The Saxon math is repetitive because it uses the spiral method of learning.  This really isn't a bad thing, although students may complain about it.  Your brain is a muscle, you have to work it out to gain strength - you can't work out 1 time and then go win a race.  Students add skills all year, without losing the skills they learned previously. This is exactly what we are looking for because math is the language of science, engineering, and any other technical/engineering/scientific type of job.  This is where Macguines is gifted so we want to encourage and support him in a way that will allow him to have a GREAT foundation in Algebra - this is the building block to higher math, which is needed in many professions.   Macguines' plan is to go on to college and study nanotechnology.
One concern that many people have with Saxon math is that their newer texts they are aligning with common core.  This is true and I would not purchase a 4th edition text as they are full of errors and nonsensical, unproven methods.  I would, however, purchase the 3rd edition .  This edition is widely available, is well researched, edited(free of errors) and is proven to be a very good text.  

On a typical day Macguines watches the DIVE CD lesson.  He then completes the lesson in the book.  The lesson is 30 questions.  If Macguines is showing me that he isn't missing anything, and he completely understands the concept, I let him do only the odd ones (so 15 questions)  but most of the time he does all 30. 
Macguines will watch the video - about 10-15 minutes, and then complete the questions - about an hour - so Math takes about 1.5 hours, 4 days per week.  There are 120 lessons and in a year he will spend about 180 hours on math.   

I hope this helps!
Amanda

Our Home Educating Journey: Growing up

Chapter 10

 

Growing up

 

I was talking to someone about homeschooling last week and I said “I was just a baby when we started this!” and my hubby, charming male that he is, laughed at me!

But, truth be told, I WAS just a baby!  I wasn’t even 30 yet!

I am thankful that when I was a child my parents took me to church and made me participate in programs like AWANAS and that when I misbehaved I had to copy chapters of the book of Proverbs.  I have hidden your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you, Lord. Psalms 119:11.  I was in my late 20’s before I understood what was meant by a daily quiet time, but I am so thankful for the mission leaders that taught me, and my husband, to do a daily quiet time.  I was given some great tools to grow up in the Lord. 

 

More than that, and building on that, I am thankful for the opportunity to home educate my children.  When we discussed homeschooling we saw it as a way to take Godly instruction to our children to the next logical step. Homeschooling has been a wonderful way to grow up some God loving kids.

Every year, about this time, there are tons of commercials and pictures that show sad faced children returning to school and mothers jumping for joy.  Until I started homeschooling I was one of those mom’s who looked forward to when my kids would not ‘bother’ me with their questions and need for fun and games.  Homeschooling grew in me a deeper love for my children and a deeper appreciation of the people that they are and someday will become!

And then one day, something totally unexpected and odd happened.

Even though I had been completely engrossed in their schooling, I missed when they grew into young men.

We went from a house of little kids to a house of older elementary and middle school kids! 

 My oldest turned 12.

My kids were getting older. 

My heart started to break a little bit. 

My oldest was yearning for a challenge, stretching out.   Growing a boy into a man is quite the task.  How many conversations did we have about respect and humility….  How many did we have about love and hatred….  How many did we have about applying the principles of the Bible to how you act every single day, and not just pulling these out on Sunday?  How do you teach these things?

There were times when my son would ask a question that was so hard that I didn’t know how to answer him and through this the Holy Spirit would give me the words to say.  More than anything it took a lot of patience and a lot of explaining every concept, every principle, and using the Bible to explain why I was asking him to help with the dishes, or to talk about a crush, or his frustrations.  Through all of this, we leaned on the Bible and what God has to say about life.

So many things that stress us out, make us worry, cause us pain, are matters of the heart.  If our heart is right, fully surrendered to God, we can find Grace in every situation.  How to teach this to children?  How to stay calm enough to teach this when the dishes aren’t done and everyone needs clean socks and who knows what we are going to eat for dinner and… the list is endless.  How can you teach matters of the heart when you are so stressed out that you can’t think strait?  Pray. Grow up.  Be a person. Pray. Talk it out.  Pray. Cover it in Grace.  Move on. Pray some more!

A book that I love The Power of a Praying Parent by Stormie Omartian helped me keep some sanity. 

Another book helped my hubby keep some sanity.  Together Drason and oldest son worked through the book ‘Preparing your son for Every Man’s Battle’ and it was a huge blessing to see the Lord working in their lives.  Their weekly guys only meetings helped Macguines to understand the man that his father is and how to become and a Godly man himself.   It also helped pave the way in some father son conversations that can be difficult to get started.

 
This year Mac turns 14.  He has grown so much that I have to look up at him to look him in the eye.  He is very proud of this, as every young man is, but I am most proud of the man he is becoming and how he is growing into a Godly man I admire.

Our Homeschooling Journey Chapter 9

Some of you may have noticed that I stopped publishing these a while back.  There is a reason for that. You see, the next chapter of our homeschooling journey is ugly. 

It is sickening for me to recall.  I remember sleepless, tear filled nights and anxious Monday mornings and the wreckage that comes from this kind of implosion.  Just as a battlefield explosion creates carnage, this event left me beaten and bloodied, reeling from the blows that were delivered.  And just like a battlefield, everyone runs for cover. 
In those life and death moments soldiers pull together and live, or only look out for themselves and die. 
We died. 
It was one of those life events that will define you forever.  You will not ever be the same afterwards, because you were alive, and now you feel dead.
 If you are the same afterwards the only conclusion I can rationally come to is that you were dead before, and you are still dead, so you are the same.
Only the Life Giver can restore you after a moment like this, only He can heal the death dealing wounds, only Him.  Only Him.  And so it is, that you wake up broken and bleeding and begin again to look to the Healer.  The Healer of hearts, the Healer of fellowship, the Healer of ministries.
Just like a recovering soldier, it is difficult to move.  It takes time, and practice to get the muscles, which once so easily operated without thought or concern, to recover from their atrophied state and begin to work correctly again.  I was wrong.  I was sorry.  I asked for forgiveness.  Christ lifted me up, out of the death hole, and set me again in sweet green grass of abundant life. 

But every once in a while I catch a whiff of that old stinking grave and the putrid rot within.  In a conversation, or an email, or from the look on a face, I will come to the knowledge, call it battlefield discernment, that they heard about that horrible day.  The day that death came, and evil danced on the graves.

I don't talk about that day.  I don't tell my side of the story.  Why go around digging up graves?  Who wants to lay out and examine the rotting remains of a corpse? Will this fix anything? Will this set right a wrong? 
Can anyone be justified by pulling out rotting flesh and pointing and saying 'Here is where I was wronged'  Can we justify ourselves?  No, we can not.  We are not able to justify ourselves, if we were we would not need our Healer.  No good comes of digging up corpses.  No good comes of packing them away and carrying them with us to place on display.  So I have left these corpses in their graves. Buried in the saving Grace of Jesus Christ, just as my own corpse.

Can I leave it there, can I say that having done all I stand in Grace, not because I am a wonderful person but because He is a wonderful God.  I think so.

If you are reading this, and you know exactly what I am talking about, then you were there. 
Or.... you may have been associating with a corpse consuming zombie.

Proverbs 26:22 The words of a talebearer are as wounds , and they go down into the innermost parts of the belly (KJV)  another version says they are like choice morsels, they go down to the inner most parts.  Have you dined at the table of a gossip?  Were you fooled into thinking the flesh you were eating was whole and good and not reclaimed from a rotting grave?

It is sneaky how we think we can dine at this table and remain unaffected.  Someone will mention something casually and we gobble it down without the slightest thought.  All too often these morsels are wrapped in the pleasant pastry of concern, or simmered in the hearty flavors of a self righteous stew, but make no mistake - death is death no matter how you dress it up.

Chapter 9 of our homeschooling journey was hard.  It was full of dying.   

Our insurance company decided that they were not going to pay for our home, which had burned down in 2008.  There was a major rift at our co-op.  My husband lost his job right after Christmas....

But it was also full of new life.

We moved to a less expensive rental home which actually fit our family much better. Drason was able to help teach the boys various subjects (especially history) and gave me the opportunity to preplan many of their lessons.  I’d never had the opportunity to do this before, so it was very encouraging and eventually time saving. Drason even allowed boys to get involved in sports again, and had the time to help coach. This was a much needed outlet for both Drason and our boys.  

God healed my heart.  He reached into ugliness and pulled out something beautiful and blooming.  Our Co-op didn't end, it didn't fall to pieces, rather it flourished. 
From a grave, he brought life.   That is sort of what He specializes in, so I shouldn't be surprised, but I was.  God was good to me.  He blessed me in spite of me.  And that is sort of the point of this rambling chapter.
God is Good, even when we are not, even when life is hard, even when you feel beaten down and broken.  
God is still there, and He is no collector of corpses. 
He brings the dead to life. 
Hallelujah and Amen!
Amanda