Singapore Math: a Better Method

This photo shows the Saxon math student workbook (first half of grade 2) stacked on top of the teacher’s guide for the whole year compared to both the student textbook and workbook for Singapore math 2A.  You can see, in visual format, just how different they are.  

I have finally found a math curriculum my boys like.  After a few hiccup starts and fails, we have become loyal Singapore Math devotees – a full 2 years late.  I should have started the system from the very beginning, but I didn’t.  Instead, I wasted a whole year trying to muddle through Saxon math, a confusing tangle of badly organized and overly involved lessons.  The difference between the two programs is remarkable.  The differences are found in their respective philosophies.   

Saxon:   

Saxon’s approach to math is to teach your child everything.  The books include every math related lesson they could think to include.  Both Singapore and Saxon teach your kid all the necessary concepts, including how to use measuring cups, read a calendar, tell time, weather measurements, measuring to the nearest foot, etc… .  Saxon, however, repeats these lessons over and over until your kid either begins to think he’s dumb for having needed to hear the same thing 50 times or he gets completely bored and walks away.  Saxon is a program that appears intended for kids who might not get much real life interactions with everyday objects.  Like I said, if it has anything remotely to do with math, you’ll find it in Saxon, and you’ll never forget it because you’ll see it dozens of times.  It’s a popular program, and it must work for some people.  But not for me.   

Singapore:   

Singapore, on the other hand, takes a no frills approach to math.  The reason I appreciate its method is that it teaches my kids the things I want them to learn without mindless repetition.  We learn addition, subtraction, multiplication and division; the lessons never deviate from the primary mission of teaching the basics.  The kids, for their part, learn because they like it, not because it’s hammered into them.  Singapore, too, teaches measurements and money and the like, but it doesn’t linger on those topics; it uses them more for context than rock solid educational concepts.  There is a logical progression to the work, and kids can see measurable progress every day.  For a parent who believes, like me, that math is straightforward and should, at least at this age, follow a linear path of logical milestones, then Singapore is the right program.  The focus of Singapore math is on math, adding contextual information as necessary and relying on you, the parent, to fill in the rest.  That’s exactly the kind of program suited for my lifestyle.   

The Teacher Experience of Singapore:   

There is no hand holding with Singapore math.  It doesn’t pretend to know how to teach better than you; it allows you to help your kids understand the concepts in the way you’ve learned that works best for them.  Each of the boys has their own workbook and separate textbook.  We simply sit at our kitchen table and work through the textbook lesson together (the textbook clearly explains the Singapore method for absorbing the concept).  When that’s done, provided the boys are still up for it, I leave them to do the workbook lessons while I read a book and wait for them to ask me questions.  When they’re done I correct it, and we go to another subject.  No problem.  You don’t have to be a trained teacher to get through Singapore.  You just need to know a few simple, universally accepted math techniques (which are clearly presented in the text).  There are no cute, new fangled ways to teach.  It’s just good old fashioned math.   

Here are the Table of Contents of Saxon Math 2 and Singapore Math 2A.  Notice the difference in the amount of contents.  To be fair though, The Saxon table of contents is for the entire year and the Singapore one is for the first half.  Even considering that fact, there are 132 Saxon lessons in a year to roughly 70 for Singapore math.  You can see, also, that Singapore math uses high quality visualizations as a primary teaching method.  Saxon feels like it was written by committee and bound at Kinko’s.