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dale45039
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| Posted: Aug 11 2009 at 8:51pm | IP Logged
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What are the pros and cons of using Saxon Math? Seems like it progresses slower in the early grades compared to other programs like Beka and too fast in high school... what has your experience been?
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Mackfam
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| Posted: Aug 12 2009 at 8:19am | IP Logged
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Hmmm...pros and cons....
Well, I'm probably only one of a very few that use Saxon from 4th grade on up so I'll take a stab.
Maureen Wittman had a great article on how she uses Saxon Math in the latest issue of Mater et Magistra. If you don't subscribe already, there is sooooooo much in this publication that will benefit your home and experience in Catholic home education besides that one article, you won't regret subscribing if it fits in your budget!!
Pros...
** lots of repetition (see the cons for further info)
** an incremental approach - each lesson builds on the previous one
** I like the lesson lay-out. I find it easy to sit down, read through the lesson with my children, work the practice set together, and then assign further practice from the problem set without having spent any time preparing or reading ahead.
** In the upper years, I prefer the lessons and approach to algebra to other programs I've reviewed.
** You can get help from Saxon if there is a concept you're having trouble explaining.
Cons
** lots of review...really! This can be a pro and a con so I listed it under both.
- Pros - A concept in Saxon is hammered in again and again through practice. This is good if a child really needs to spend some time practicing a concept. For example, my daughter is in Algebra I right now. We're working on order of operations problems...I just assign several of those for her each week - the math isn't an issue, but she needs extra work with concrete practice. So, having the extra repetition is a help for her right now. Once she's got the concept down cold, I won't assign any more of those problems
- Cons - If a concept is mastered then assigning drill after drill after drill breeds boredom and just seems like busywork. Assess if a concept is understood...if it is, just don't assign those particular problems from the problem set.
** Sometimes Saxon seems to move so slowly...so, we just read a lesson and move on to the next one.
** Every now and then, they seem to interject a lesson that seems out of place to me...not in sequence with the incremental nature of introducing concepts. It's a little annoyance.
** If you have a student that is extremely gifted and accelerated in math, this program might not be enough.
Saxon works in our family for a few reasons I think...
** I enjoy math. I'm a very visual person so if I can *see* a concept in my head I can think of a way to explain it - a hands on way, an on the paper way, a story way.
** I'm not intimidated to step outside of the approach outlined to offer a tool that might be helpful to the student.
** My husband is an engineer/math major!! So, if I'm stumped on explaining a concept, my husband can step in with ease and help.
** The book is a very good guide, but I also don't mind accelerating or slowing down according to the pace and needs of the child. Some days we zoom through 10 lessons a day (usually at the beginning of the year when most of those lessons are review)...sometimes we spend an entire week on one lesson pulling extra practice problems from other lessons.
** Some books are superfluous. I move quickly through Math 5/4...very quickly! It could be dropped altogether probably and just move straight to Math 6/5 if there is a solid formation of basic math concepts from elementary years. I skip Math 8/7 altogether. I only used half of Algebra 1/2 as it's really just a prep course. Moving slowly through Algebra I is working really well for us.
There is not a perfect math program out there, but there are many good ones beyond Saxon. Many families who don't feel comfortable teaching math, especially at the upper level, find that the Teaching Textbooks program is a help for them as it is all taught via a lesson on a CD the student uses with the computer. I've looked at the program, and though I don't think it is the right fit for us, it is a good program, very complete and presented in an engaging way. I wanted to throw that option out there. There are just sooooo many other great math programs...ones that are no-frills, ones that are manipulative based, ones that are more unschooly.
Are you thinking of Saxon in general...or were you considering it for a specific age? I ask this because I *don't* use Saxon for the early grades (K-3rd) at all...my recommendations would be totally different for younger students. Hope some of this is helpful...I wish Janet (ALMom) were around...she has some great insights in teaching math and I know she's used Saxon at some point.
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Jen Mackintosh
Wife to Rob, mom to dd 19 , ds 16, ds 11, dd 8, and dd 3
Wildflowers and Marbles
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dale45039
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| Posted: Aug 12 2009 at 9:47am | IP Logged
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Thanks for all your insight Jennifer!  My kids are 8 and under. A friend of mine was asking my wife about Saxon for her 10-year-old son. Since we have no experience with it, I thought I'd ask my friends here at 4Real.
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ALmom
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| Posted: Aug 12 2009 at 7:18pm | IP Logged
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OK, I was a math major and my dh is an engineer who uses math all the time - so we have a degree of comfort with whatever math program we use. It is more how you help the children make the connections, than the text or program you use. Honestly, I end up culling from my collection from time to time so my children can look at a different view of a concept, etc.
I currently have one child working in Jacob's (it was a relief for him to put up Saxon). Another child who will be moving into 1 year of Saxon after finishing Singapore. Another child doing Singapore - but taking a break to drill for a bit and solidify multiplication facts. He is needing to "see" it more visually and the step by step just overwhelms at this point. I've pulled out MUS blocks and lined them up more like Montessori, I think.
We have used Saxon, MUS, Singapore, Jacob's, Developmental math, Addison Wesley and probably a hodge podge of others that are just leftover from my math courses and lots of manipulatives and games. I often have one program we are following in a given year, but know that a different program really does a super job introducing something and will pull from the shelf just to introduce something and then go back to the main text. Sometimes I just use the manipulatives I have, sometimes other textual presentations.
Saxon:
Pro - very parent friendly in terms of set up. It has solutions worked out and other such. (Most of the other texts will give answers but not show how they got there - ie you need to be able to do the problems yourself so you can explain a mistake if your child misses something). I sometimes find that seeing a problem worked out will remind me of something I'm forgetting from way back when that I need to emphasize - ie Saxon has enough variety that they generally catch those mistakes that stem from very minor misunderstandings.
In the younger grades (K - 3), it is very scripted and parent intensive, but some of the ideas like asking random questions like "How many days in 3 weeks, really solidified some multiplication facts in a painless way. In any case, after 3rd, Saxon is easier than most textbooks I've seen, especially for a parent without much math confidence. Just, be willing to get help for giving a good overview of concepts in more concrete ways so the student can really think mathematically. Saxon will not help you do that. That may not be a major issue early on, but might be when you get to more complicated things.
Plenty of practice so the child has time for the concepts to solidify
pretty thorough coverage (eventually they get to everything and explain every single step which can be a disadvantage for some learners without having the overview first)
solid use of math vocabulary
Cons - concepts are sometimes so truncated that you cannot see the big picture. This is especially true in the Algebra text with some of the steps prior to factoring. They introduce something early in its minutest detail, then don't connect it with the reason you are doing it in the first place for another 20 - 30 lessons. If you struggled through Algebra, instead of loving it, then you may find yourself going nuts at this point. I've helped a lot of folks over the phone (in Algebra most especially) simply because the kids were not making connections and mom wasn't sure what was wrong. I didn't find this a problem in the earlier texts as much.
Some folks who are very step by step learners really thrive with this Saxon approach or are at least able to make most of the connections by building up. It kills my big picture learners who want as few words as possible. I've had some bizzare long division errors that took me forever to figure out what in the world my children were thinking. Problem was - they weren't really thinking. They felt so lost in the detail, that they were hopelessly trying to memorize steps and couldn't remember at which point you multiplied, subtracted, added - when and which numbers you brought down. Obviously, we needed to take a different approach. Saxon only offers one way (the step by step here is how you do it). If you don't know how to just pull something out and demonstrate a concept, then you'll either have to get a tutor, find some help or switch or supplement with something else if these kinds of things come up. If these are minor or occasional glitches - then you call a math loving friend. If it happens too often, you know the program isn't very well suited to your child.
not very many practical application problems so you don't get a very clear idea of why you use/need something. Very few word problems that are really multi-step (at least in comparison to Singapore) and very little mental math. (I think the more recent texts have a bit more of this). I like my children to think mathematically first - then we can practice and solidify concepts. Saxon is great for solidifying concepts, not so great for teaching concepts in terms of practical, really seeing it mathematically in a big scheme sort of way.
Saxon is more focused on telling you step by step how to solve a problem (and they don't leave any steps out). This is how I loved math. My big picture learners just weren't making any connections this way and were lost trying to memorize steps that made no sense to them. Now, with our family background, we really could and have used Saxon succesfully much like Jennifer described. I actually circle problems in pencil right in the text and either erase or add in ones to do based on what they need to work on. However, with my house full of big picture learners who don't like very many words, I always had to at least give them a big picture, concrete demonstration of concepts and let them work with this for a while. So, for long division, we pulled out MUS blocks and showed how to do it without the short cut - keeping track of all those place values and let them discover the steps - then went back to Saxon to practice. We do something similiar for fractions. I could not use Saxon with some of my later children because of vision issues - ie they couldn't copy, the quantity of problems on a page overwhelmed the eyes and such. I could have used it otherwise - though I would have done it in my own way. I still want my children to do one solid review of the step by step, "how to review" before Algebra.
Saxon does not have a seperate geometry course and the geometry it does cover is most heavily focused on calculating areas of various things (most of which look odd and unless you can explain applications to children, they can seem arbitrarily made up and rather silly). You lose some of the beauty of the systematic development of why something "works" and no proofs. I know I'm a strange one, but I loved my geometry course where we took no more than 3 givens and proved every single other thing we ever used. We used the first rules so much in other things and in trying to prove something else before we could use it, that I simply never forgot this stuff. I really think others do a much better job with Geometry - and many folks who use Saxon do take a break for one year and add in a Geometry course.
I think that is my 2 cents.
Janet
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Mackfam
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| Posted: Aug 12 2009 at 9:33pm | IP Logged
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I'm glad you jumped in, Janet! I always enjoy your perspective with math!
ALmom wrote:
| Saxon does not have a seperate geometry course |
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I just saw this today - it appears Saxon has a dedicated geometry course now. Looks like they put this out in March 08. I haven't seen it yet though...I don't know how it compares or what it looks like.
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Jen Mackintosh
Wife to Rob, mom to dd 19, ds 16, ds 11, dd 8, and dd 3
Wildflowers and Marbles
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4Real Forums : Living and Loving Numbers
Topic: Saxon Math
