Saxon Math Questions
 

I am going to try Saxon math for my youngest child. I am trying to get away from Teaching Textbooks because all of my kids so far have done fine in elementary, but then for some reason have really learned nothing to prepare them for Pre-algebra/Algebra.
She will be getting level 2.
Do I need to get the manipulative kit? I have never spent so much on a math curriculum before, and for a second grader, that just seems a little over the top.
How time/teacher intensive is it?
My goal is to spend 1 hour with each kid individually each day, so I am thinking half for math and half for LA.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

My ds did great with Saxon Math. In his case the manipulatives were very helpful.

How much is Saxon math these days? IIRC we paid less than $200 including manipulative about ten years ago.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

That is about right. It would be about $175ish for all the books and manipulatives. It just seems like a lot to me for one subject for one child in elementary school.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

Do you have any local home school used sailes I see the reusable portions of saxion for sail a lot near me. I also know some people who have large gapes in kids who trade/ rent saxion stuff out.

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Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

I'm with you on that - I don't think I've ever spent that much on a single subject. (Except the microscope for high school biology.) I used to get annoyed at $50/per kid/year on new math workbooks :shifty. Seconding knitlove that you might want to look for used - I get everything I can used, and that helps keep my costs down.

Is there a reason you are thinking Saxon in particular?

As far as manipulatives for elementary math in general, I really like Cuisenaire rods (I also use them as base-10 blocks, which are very handy to have around). I've also gotten a lot of use out of having a bunch of fake jewels around to use as counters - anything you have a lot of, like pennies or poker chips or lego blocks, would work. Coins and poker chips are also good for place value work.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

I like the high schoo math. I have tutored from it several times. I am looking to get away from Teaching Textbooks and I don't really know what else is out there that spirals.
I am open to suggestions, but the Saxon levels are easy to pick and it is not complicated.

I think I could scrounge up things for manipulatives,but it has stuff like clocks and balance scales and pattern blocks. We have all the MUS blocks, so base 10 is covered.

We have a homeschool consignment store, but they don't have it in stock right now.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

I'm on my third student going through Saxon, so I've clearly liked it for the most part (not a fan of Geometry). We are on Algebra 2 right now. If you like it, once beyond the worksheet phase and into the book phase, the cost has been spread over all three kids.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

It can seem that way, but if you think about it, you could spend $200 on each of the four core subjects, plus another $200 on electives, and you're still only spending 10% of what most good school systems spend per student. :shrug3

---------- Post added at 06:03 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:46 PM ----------

Side note...my ds is now finishing up high school (we homeschooled for grades 1-3 while seeking medical diagnoses), and looking back, math is probably the most crucial subject to have a solid curriculum and to get right. Without a solid foundation in elementary, it really can short circuit the middle school/high school math path.

I'm having trouble finding the correct words here, but I feel like a lot of what I did with DS using Saxon is why he had the foundation to do well in middle school math, which then set him up well for Algebra>Geometry>Trig, and now precalculus.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

I just started using Apologia Math with my youngest and I have really liked it - they only have up through 3rd grade so far (and she's in 2nd).

ETA: https://www.apologia.com/product-cat...ementary-math/

We use an abacus and a white board for our manipulatives. [Prior to this we used Singapore Math for 8 years]

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

If saxion is too much then you might want to look at Math mlMammoth. Mammoth is generally a mastery curriculum but she has recently added in separate review work books to use on conjunction with the grade level books ( light blue series) to turn it in to a spiraling curriculum.

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Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

Do you have a buy/sell homeschool FB group? Or buy from an online used book shop that ships, I have one near me. It's usually not hard to find, I never bought a copy at full price. I used Saxon the first couple years then switched to beast academy. You can take as much time as you like with Saxon, they say you have to do everything but I didn't always. The manipulatives can be whatever you have around the house. A balance scale is not that much and they get a lot of fun out of it. Other than that, I used whatever I had around :shrug3 I got a little clock at Goodwill, used Legos and stuffed animals and minifigs and beans and hangars and food, whatever I felt would keep their interest.

Re: Saxon Math Questions
 

I know many families who use Saxon and I think it would be fairly easy to find used.