This was very helpful to have a nice general view of the different levels, and how you are using it within your homeschool. Thank you for sharing that!
This is our 9th year homeschooling but our first year to use Saxon. My oldest is using it for Algebra 1 for 9th grade. We're using it with Nicole the Math Lady and I love it! I do think the constant review would be a bit much for my younger, very math inclined boys, but for algebra I think it's great. That constant review is needed, I think. I plan to stick with it for geometry next year.
I know you can purchase a membership plan with Nicole the Math Lady and they offer options where they will grade some of the work. They also have an option called "Nicole's Study Hall" where your student can get extra help if needed. Those are options if you purchase a membership with the Nicole the Math Lady site. I hope that helps! Here is the website if you'd like to check it out some more: nicolethemathlady.com/
Thank you! Very helpful! I have been so scared to use Saxon k with my littlest one but I bought it for some reason 😥 Now I feel so much better! I will give it a try. My little girl loves to write and draw maybe she will need extra. Umber practice and what not it I was on the verge of buying her TGTB just so she can have work book to do
Excellent video! I get tempted to switch to Saxon every year, lol. My 15-year-old daughter has learning disabilities and she's currently using Math-U-See Zeta level, which is decimals and percents. She struggles with word problems a LOT. The pros are that the worksheets are short, not too much clutter on a page, and she loves Mr. Demme 😉. The cons are I don't feel like there is enough spiral- there is some but not enough- she seems to have forgotten how to add fractions... and not enough variety of topics. If I were to disregard her love of MUS, I'm not sure whether she would use 76 or 87... I've heard great things about Nicole the Math Lady but not sure how she would feel about switching.
I absolutely love the spiral, however since your daughter loves MUS so much I would have a hard time switching too! I wonder if there would be any supplemental "fun" math things your daughter would enjoy that would help with "cementing" the concepts she's already mastered, since there isn't as much review in MUS. If you want to look into switching you could certainly have your daughter do a placement test. The middle grade placement test is here: learningthings.com/content/SAX_Middle-Grades-Math.pdf
Hi! I will be a first time homeschooling parent next fall. Do you know if Saxon math is common core based? We are trying to stay away from that since my daughter has had so much trouble with it this year. Thanks!
Hi! Congratulations on homeschooling this fall! Saxon math was published long before the Common Core was created. From the research I have done, the homeschool Saxon math books (the books that are two toned) are not compliant with Common Core standards. However, it appears that the school textbooks that are used in schools (the books that have colorful pictures on the front) have been adapted to be Common Core compliant. I hope that helps! let me know if there's anything we can do to help you on this new adventure!
That’s so interesting! I’d love to hear more about your experience teaching the mastery approach. I believe that both approaches aim for general mastery of all covered math concepts.
How can I help? What specifically are you looking for? More info, placement tests, answers to specific questions? Let me know your questions and I’m happy to give more info to help.
I am curious as to why you skipped Saxon math 6/5? Would you mind going into more detail on why you made that decision 😉 great review! We love Saxon too
My daughter was really comfortable with the Saxon 5/4. She easily understood the concepts and yet completing the entire lesson would take her SO MUCH TIME. After researching a bunch, (you can check out the scope and sequence of each Saxon book on the publisher's website,) I decided that 6/5 is too repetitive of 5/4. I knew I might have to be a little more involved in explaining new concepts to her (if they were introduced in detail in 6/5) but with all of the review in the first few lessons, she's had no problems so far! Doing half of the work the first day and the other half of the lesson the next day seems to be extremely effective for her. I REALLY didn't want to skip problems because I love the benefits of the spiral approach. (Although I know other homeschoolers choose to do this and find it helpful to them.) She doesn't dread the mental math, word problems, and fact sheets like she used to... I think it's simply because she's working fewer problems per day. Here's the scope and sequence chart: www.hmhco.com/~/media/sites/home/education/global/pdf/scope-and-sequence/mathematics/k-12/saxon-math-homeschool/shs_math54_math87_ss.pdf?la=en I also found a few other blogs of moms that skipped a book (although if I remember right one of them skipped 5/4 instead of 6/5, the other skipped 6/5), I think hearing about the success of others was helpful to encourage me to go for it!
I have five adult children they were home educated also. I am an advocate of Saxon math which is advanced beyond the public school curriculum so my children tested out always always grades ahead in their math, English comprehension, and reading skill level. Please, use Saxon math and watch how your children are progressing and go by them. I saw that that particular book was repetitive also.
I'm assuming you did Saxon 5/4 with a 4th grade child and then for 5th grade went to 7/6. Is that correct? So doing 7/6 for 2 years would be for 5th and 6th grade, and then on to 8/7 or Algebra 1/2 for 7th? I've read that 8/7 and Alg 1/2 are very similar and many use Alg 1/2 instead of 8/7. If I have this correct will you be doing Algebra 1 in 8th grade?
Yes, we did Saxon 5/4 for 4th grade and then started a slower pace for 7/6 in 5th grade. We are finishing up 7/6 this year in 6th grade. And then I will be evaluating whether to do 8/7 or Alg 1/2 for 7th. (I'm leaning toward 8/7) That would lead us to Algebra 1 in 8th grade. At this point I am not planning to do Saxon's geometry, as there is so much geometry covered in Algebra 1 & 2. But also... subject to change. 😆
Also, I really think my daughter needed the slower pace in 5th grade. But I'm not planning to do that again... I need to make another video about what I learned from doing that. Basically, it seemed to have the opposite effect of helping her to do math more quickly. 🙄
Hi, coming back to your video, after our wobble in math for my middle kid. We are now back doing 87 and MuS pre-algebra together, but only doing 1 sheer of MuS a day, but still doing all the mus sheets available as my son needs the practice, so he’s taking 2 weeks to do one lesson in MUS rather than the typical week. Mus lesson is designed for approx a week I think. I’d love to learn about your journey from 54 to 76, did you make a video on this?
My son is starting kindergarten and I'm doing TGTB math k. Do you think I can start saxon level 1 next year when he'll be in first grade or better to go theough saxon k first?
I use First Language Lessons for the Well-Trained Mind for grammar. I'll share the video I did when I shared more about that curriculum. I also do Institute for Excellence in Writing (IEW) for the writing part of language arts. We take our time going through the IEW curriculum. We did a younger curriculum, (IEW) Bible Heroes, and then started using IEW Level 1A and used the video teaching by Andrew Pudewa. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-49cDTbR7KIU.html
I'm not sure I am the best one to answer this because my experience was that Saxon DID prepare me for college (as I tested at a post college mathematics level when I was finished with Saxon math). Maybe someone else here in the comments would have some good insight on why they feel it wasn't a good curriculum for them?
Saxon math is ANYTHING but lacking. I used it for my daughter and she not only graduated high school early (she went back into the public school system after being home 4 years) but she also graduated college early Summa Cum Laude. She was so advanced in math and other subjects she graduated both institutions early. A lot of it had to do with her advanced math skills. I credit Saxon for that 💯
I'd love to hear more about your negative experience with Saxon Math. Would you please give more information about your background with Saxon, explain how you used it and what you wound up doing Math Wise?
We have been homeschooling for 11 years now with several kids and finally tried Saxon this last school year and I wish I had been using it all along. I can’t remember what my apprehension was all these years. We have used many curriculums over the years but now that we are immersed in Saxon I like how it gives a good math foundation for my kids. It takes more time to do like you mentioned. But it’s worth it. We use mymathassistant.com to allow for more independence and to accommodate the audio and visual learners. Thanks for your review I learned a lot.
