It’s like testing pasta, you throw it against the wall and see what sticks. Seriously.
When I was homeschooling a fifth grade child, and before that child, a third grade and then a 6th grade child, I was able to make use of the State of California’s program, which in the very late 80’s and early 90’s was safe, sane and easy as pie. You were provided with the books and lesson plans being used in your local public school and a public school teacher was assigned to oversee you and your child’s progress. If something wasn’t working they had access to a vast selection of resources, up to and including patching kids in with graduate students at UC Berkeley.
When I was teaching a 9th and 10th grade student in the District of Columbia I hired a tutor and told student and instructor to work at their own pace, but to be sure they “got it”. If a concept wasn’t understood, they were to, together, find another instructor/book/seminar/website, until the student was able to demonstrate she had a firm grasp on the concept. (We were lucky enough to have a family members teaching advanced mathematics at Stanford/UCB/UCLA and Lawrence Livermore Labs). We weren’t just looking for a good score on the SAT. We wanted clear comprehension.
Teaching my daughter in Kindergarten was simple. She required concrete examples so we used a combination of Singapore Math workbooks and manipulative of all manner. My daughter was so excited by Singapore Math that she worked ahead, by her own choice, through the Kindergarten, 1st grade and well into the 2nd grade curriculum. Couldn’t have asked for better. She did on her own than her brother did with daily instruction at school (using a variation of Horizion, a program I have respect for).
Now we must choose a mathematics course for my son. Oak Meadow is complete, but light and it already bores my son. Additionally, if I rely upon that program alone he won’t be ready for 5th grade math by next fall. We are exploring Singapore, Saxon, Horizon, Math-Tacular, Time-4-Learning. We will likely go with Singapore, due to the success I have had with it before, although we have a few Horizon books on hand and are testing the waters there.
For the next few weeks I’m allowing my son to play on math web sites, just noodling around and having fun. The other math work he’s going is multiplication timed sheets and finally working on practical household applications. (“Son, double this recipe for me, please.” “Son, figure out how much tax I’m going to owe when I buy these books here… or here.” “Son, how much tip do I leave the pizza guy.”)
4th and 5th grade math is still easy days. Today I purchased ‘Pre-Algebra for Dumbies’ because when my daughter comes to me with questions this coming school year, I need to be able to at least point her in the right direction.
A+ Homeschool 