Saxon

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Home : 2002 : January : 20

Saxon
By Rebecca

A lot of people are turned on by Saxon. I have used it several years and my students (and others) have done poorly on the state tests in Math! We were told that we have to do something to raise these scores...anything we
can think of. So, this year I have gone back to a Math book. Like you said, the lessons move on to something new and the kids may not have quite gotten it. If you go back and spend more time on a particular skill, you don't get everything covered. Don't get me wrong, Saxon is NOT all bad! I do like the fact that it repeats things a lot, but NOT everything. For your subtraction (which

my kids in the past had trouble with but this year understand it better) try this phrase (I got it here on the board from someone else and it HAS worked). Bigger on Bottom, Better Borrow! My kids say this each time and it helps them understand if they need to regroup on not. Hope this helps.
Now for your problem. Do you teach your own homeroom? We change for Math. You could teach your Saxon during Math time but then do a Daily Math in the Morning. Have things on the board for them to work as Morning Work and then go over it spend time on skills they don't understand. If you have your own kids for Math, then have your Saxon lesson, then get out some old Math books. They need to atleast see them. My kids at the end of the year last year had a hard time with a Math book because we had used Saxon worksheets all year. They had trouble transferring a problem from the book to paper.
These are just MY experiences. Like I said I don't want to down Saxon!! It does have its good points!