review of Critical Thinking/Bright Minds Beginning Mathematical Reasoning

My 4-year old daughter is really enjoying this thick, colorful beginning math book from the Bright Minds/Critical Thinking company. It's a softcover workbook, with 235 pages of lessons in all areas of math reasoning, from counting to comparing and estimating.

So far we have enjoyed each preschool book we received from Critical Thinking. They are always colorful and with only a few problems per page, they don't make my children feel overwhelmed.

This book is meant to be used and written in, but I like to place a page protector over the pages needing written work so my daughter can use them again if she wants. Add a wipe-off marker and you're set to go.

Working 2-3 pages each day only takes a few minutes of the child's time and there is no parental prep work. Just open the book and go. Easy to understand and explain, easy to use.

Critical Thinking has a wide range of curriculum for all ages and subjects. Whether you're ready to teach a 1st grader to read, prepare a 5th grader to take an achievement test, or to help a high schooler learn about wars in our past, this company has a lot to offer on a lot of levels. By using books or software, from the youngest to the oldest, teach your child how to really THINK using products from Critical Thinking.
There are free items to try so give them a visit at:
http://www.criticalthinking.com/index.jsp

-Lynn

review of Math Mammoth

Let's talk about Math Mammoth. Math Mammoth is available at http://www.mathmammoth.com/. These are a series of inexpensive down loadable math workbooks for grades 3-8 and complete down loadable math curricula for grades 1-5. There are four series of these math e-books, written by Maria Miller, a math teacher. The series are Blue (math presented by TOPIC for grades 1-5), Light Blue (this is the complete set for grades 1-5), Golden (worksheets organized by grade for grades 3-8; not a complete text), and Green (worksheets for grades 3-8 organized by topic). Please note that there are no explanations in either the Green or Golden series, just problems.

The website goes into great detail about which item to use with your children. You can sign up to receive the Math Mammoth emails/newsletter and you'll get a bonus of 280 free worksheets and sample pages.

I got to download two products, the Golden series grade 7/pre-algebra set and the complete Light blue 3rd grade set. I really think these could be a very useful and cost-effective tool for homeschooling families. My only setback was I didn't have as long as I usually do the test the products extensively. Math texts are not something I want to skip around in so we began...where else? At the beginning, which is, as Maria sang in The Sound of Music, a very good place to start. Unfortunately we have only covered about 20 pages of the third grade book. There have been a couple of times where I wasn't sure what my son was supposed to do on a certain section of a page but overall, I felt the set would be worth the small investment. The sheets for this grade are grouped into little sections with plenty of practice work in each area. All your basic grade-level topics are covered in a mastery approach fashion, with plenty of emphasis on multiplication.

As for my older son, we tried to tie the Math Mammoth sheets in with our current ALEKS.com pre-algebra lessons and it made it very confusing for him. The ALEKS site doesn't necessarily present the material in the same order as the Math Mammoth site, and although I think I could look into the topics presented in each and try to correlate them, I simply didn't have sufficient time to do so.

I am no math whiz...ask me about history or language or spelling even, but not math. Ugh. So I always find the need for a very detailed explanation of each section or I cannot teach it to my children. In the older grades you get the worksheets and answer keys but no explanations. If I remember correctly, some of the author's material was originally written to coincide with tutoring sessions rather than as a complete stand-alone text. With both of us being weaker in math than other areas, I found within the first 2-3 days of use that the Golden and Green series would not be suitable for my oldest son alone, nor are they meant to be. But I am sure that if you have a child who just needs some additional practice (but already has a decent grasp on pre-algebra) these sheets would be great. Again, the prices for these products is outstanding for what you receive.
I hope that after my son has a thorough grasp of pre-algebra then we can return to the Math Mammoth sheets for review and drill work.

I would be more inclined to purchase this product for my younger son, for whom the complete set is available with explanations. :) The Blue series electronic books only cost between $2-5.50 each so it'd be pretty inexpensive to try. I would suggest getting the newsletter with the free pages/samples and then going from there into perhaps purchasing one of the Blue books to try.
-Lynn