Comments

.. to both of you! This is huge!

This is TOTALLY what this site is about!

-- CarolynJohnston - 23 Jun 2005

From me as well. I was given Saxon 65 by someone and intend to use it to review my daughter over the summer. She suffers from ADD and can't grasp concepts quickly. You and your son have given me (and I'm sure others) great hope.

-- BarryGarelick - 23 Jun 2005

Catherine,

Let me add my congratulations. You both worked very hard for it.

-- AnneDwyer - 24 Jun 2005

"We also learned, yesterday, that Christopher will be in Phase 4 math next year, in grade 6."

This is the best news. Both of you can be proud.

-- SteveH - 24 Jun 2005

I don't know what else to say except Congradulations! It is an inspiring achievement.

-- CarlLarson - 24 Jun 2005

Oh gosh!

I just saw all this! (I've been away, in Washington--)

Thank you so much!

Yes, this is what the site is about, for me.

I think you can all see that I've been pretty open about my own lack of mathematical expertise. I've discovered late in life that I LOVE math, but I'm a newbie to put it mildly.

One of the reasons I've been open about my newbie-ness is that if I can do it, anyone can do it.

Christopher is almost certainly not naturally gifted at math. (I don't really approve of making those kinds of statements about any child--look at Carolyn's personal history if you want to know why--but I'm making an exception.)

I don't think Christopher is naturally gifted at math.

He has good 'general intelligence,' and he has no learning disabilities that we've seen.

He also doesn't appear to have ADD, ADHD, borderline autism, etc.

So he was a bright kid failing math, and I was a bright mom who hadn't done any math in 30 years -- and who learned all the math she knew in a farm town in central Illinois.

I wish to heck I could find the Saxon quote about how 'the secretary down the hall can teach math using my book'--it's true!

I was the secretary down the hall.

-- CatherineJohnson - 26 Jun 2005

I want to say 'thank you' to Carolyn, too.

This is another subject for an 'up front' post.

When I set out to teach Christopher, I had two resources:

• Saxon Math

• 'math mentors'

Carolyn, Ed (who taught high school math for underprivileged kids earning their GEDs), my neighbor, Laura Read, and my friend, Debbie Gieringer, were my math mentors.

I leaned on them heavily at times. (And now, of course, I post problems here when I need help.)

In the early days, all of them spent a fair amount of time explaining things like why 'times' means 'of.'

Once I get to algebra they're going to be back on the spot!

-- CatherineJohnson - 26 Jun 2005

In any case, Carolyn and I both hope Kitchen Table Math can help parents help their kids.

-- CatherineJohnson - 26 Jun 2005

was given Saxon 65 by someone and intend to use it to review my daughter over the summer. She suffers from ADD and can't grasp concepts quickly.

Boy, I'll tell you.

I am a HUGE believer in Saxon Math at this point.

Because I just barely understood anything about elementary math one year ago, apart from 2 + 2 = 4. (Again, I was 'math-friendly; no math phobia, etc. And I was always able to do the math I needed to do in real life. But I absolutely did not have 'pedagogical content knowledge,' and I had very poor conceptual understanding of math. I was a person with pretty good procedural knowledge of everyday math, and that was it.)

Every article I've seen on SAXON MATH tells me that kids with any kind of learning problem thrive in it.

The repetition is huge, vast, amazing.

At the end of a 500 page book the child is still practicing concepts he learned and practiced on page 1.

I don't know much about memory and retrieval problems in ADD. I wish I did. (My nephew has this issue. He'll learn something...but then a year later he hasn't got it. He's a bright kid; it's not an issue of intelligence ... )

SAXON MATH seems to have been created with all of the core research into learning as a guide.

The other thing that impressed me about SAXON MATH is how well minority kids do with it.

This is a curriculum that can be taken into communities where the kids won't have tutors or parents like me who can rustle up a posse of math mentors.

Underprivileged kids can do well with SAXON MATH with no external resources, and after years of poor learning.

That makes me a believer.

-- CatherineJohnson - 26 Jun 2005