Math Curriculum

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Math Curriculum
By Amanda K

We have actually just chosen a new textbook for math in our district. In K-3, we were using the D.C. Heath "Math Every Day" curriculum, which I personally did not like because I felt that it did not teach effective memorization
of math concepts. There were a lot of manipulatives that allowed students to explore concepts of math, and my kids enjoyed this to some extent, but I had to bring in a lot of outside worksheets in order to prepare the kids for the rigors of their end-of-trimester standards-based exams. Plus, my kids became very tired of manipulatives if we did them too much (i.e., "every day").

I do like this curriculum because of the calendar activities that it suggested, which were helpful to me as a new first grade teacher.

Our new textbook is from Houghton Mifflin, and it has been very carefully geared to meet California state standards. Although I have not yet taught from this book, I feel I am going to like it because it seems to strike a perfect balance between manipulative type activities and worksheet, memorization exercises. I will, however, maintain my D.C. Heath calendar activities because I feel these skills are important and I don't think that Houghton Mifflin delves too much into this type of activity (although I could be wrong, since I don't have the book in front of me right now).

Good luck! And I hope to hear from other people. I'm always curious to see how we're measuring up here in CA, what with all the recent standard revamping we've been doing.