Math Mammoth offers complete math curriculum for grades 1 to 4. It is mastery-oriented curriculum that focuses on a topic at length before moving on. It focuses on conceptual understanding and mastery of mental math and provides lots of visual models. We were sent the download for the complete second grade curriculum. The download included both 2A and 2B, answer keys, tests, cumulative reviews, a worksheet maker, and Soft-Pak.
I am very pleased with Math Mammoth. The lessons are thorough and well explained. Each chapter includes links to free online games for extra (fun) practice. There are links to Math Mammoth videos as well, to use if extra tips are needed for a concept.
There is no need for a text book or teacher's manual, as each lesson begins with clear instructions and explanations, and sample worked problems. There are review lessons at the end of each chapter and I found that these were useful in knowing what Bear still needed to work on. We've been able to work on fact families (which included double digit numbers), doubling, halves, and are just starting on time to the minutes.
Bear isn't fond of worksheets and I sometimes write in answers for her (as seen above).
The exercises are challenging. It is an advanced curriculum, but I chose second grade because we already had a full first grade curriculum and Bear seemed to need more challenge. Math Mammoth is challenging. She is managing but needs a bit more scaffolding to ensure she is understanding. There are placement tests to help you choose the best level for your child (I just didn't see these until I was writing the review!) and if you still aren't sure, you can email Maria Miller, the author of Math Mammoth books, and she will help you with finding the right level.
The second grade curriculum focuses on memorizing the basic addition and subtraction facts with single-digit numbers, developing fluency with multidigit addition and subtraction, and place value with 3-digit numbers. Other topics studied are reading the clock to the five-minute intervals; measuring length, weight, and volume; shapes and a few simple geometry concepts; and money topics. (from the website) A wonderful thing about the Math Mammoth curriculum is that the money chapter is included in 5 currencies, making this a great curriculum for international families.
The Math Mammoth Complete Curriculum for second grade (the light blue series) is available as a download for $34.00. If you prefer a hard copy, you can purchase it for $53.40 at Rainbow Resource.
Math Mammoth also offers supplemental materials, like worksheets by grade or topic.
I received a free copy of the second grade Light Blue Series in order to write this review and have shared my honest opinion. If you would like to read more reviews please visit the TOS Homeschool Crew blog.
It sounds like a great curriculum even though I personally prefer a spiral model. It's great that Bear does 2nd grade math already.
ReplyDeleteHow do you like this compared to Singapore Math?
ReplyDeleteI guess enough that when Homeschool Buyer's Coop had the sale a couple of months back, I bought the whole Light Blue series for grades 1-6. Bear likes it better than Singapore. I feel it is equally challenging and I like that everything is together in one place better. I still like Singapore though, and we are still using the second grade Singapore and I will use the third grade as well since I bought it used before I bought the MM. If I didn't already have the third grade SM though, I would just use MM. MM goes in better depth for measurement and time. SM has hardly anything on those. We also have and use Miquon sporadically.
ReplyDelete