Our Favorite Homeschool Curriculum Choices for Math - PreK through High School

Summary:  Are your kids struggling with their chosen math curriculum? Are you looking for another way to go that might fit their learning style better? How we dealt with math through the years when we needed to make changes in our curriculum. Plus living math ideas. Homeschool math for preschool, elementary middle school and high school. And you don't have to be good at math to provide your kids with a solid math education.

Are you kids struggling with their chosen math curriculum?  Are you looking for another way to go that might fit their learning style better?

We switched out our math curriculum more than once in our homeschool, once in elementary, and then again in high school.

Sometimes our original choice in homeschool math curriculum just didn't make the grade, so to speak.  

So we did search around for other options again, and each time we found a math curriculum that worked better than the original one. 

It was hard to let go of our initial homeschool curriculum choice, and it did impact our budget, but each time it made for a happy math student in our house.  

And success in her math studies.

PRESCHOOL and KINDERGARTEN

Math has always been something that my daughter looked forward in our homeschool.  

From playful learning approaches during preschool/K to challenging courses in Algebra 2 and Geometry in high school, we have always taken a hands-on approach.  

And each of our math curriculum favorites showed us just how to teach math to our child.  And it was not hard to do.

Let's start with prekindergarten and Kindergarten.

For preschool and kindergarten, you really don't even need a math curriculum.

Counting, adding, subtracting, making sets....all of that can be discovered through play.  

For how we did that in our home, click here for my article on:

HomeschoolingEarly Math - Making Your Manipulative Kit and More.   

If you want a math curriculum for kindergarten, Saxon Math has a very 

easy to follow math program for doing just that.

Amy, of the Curriculum Choice, has a review on Saxon Math 

Kindergarten. 

EARLY ELEMENTARY

Then in the primary grades, we chose to use Saxon Math, as it relies on lots of hands-on approaches.  

And again, Saxon shows you just how to teach math!

Young learners often need to see, feel, and touch objects to learn the processes of basic math.  There are lots of used Saxon curriculum resources on the web, under homeschool used curriculum.

Saxon Math is available all the way through high school.

UPPER ELEMENTARY

In fourth grade we switched 

to Oak Meadow Math.  

It is based on Saxon Math, but has a 

few less practice problems, 

which felt less stressful for my 

daughter.

It is child friendly, and is not at all 

associated with common core.

Oak Meadow Math uses the spiral 

learning approach, with lots of review.  

Through this, my daughter did work that built retention. 

She was remembering what she learned!

MIDDLE SCHOOL

When we got into pre-Algebra I felt the need to get some  help with 

my math teaching. 


I did not recall my Algebra facts from my high school years.  Who does?

We looked around and found the Saxon Dive dvd's.

I loved how they explained each problems, with a chalkboard approach.

The instructor wrote out each problem as he discussed them.

Saxon also has another product called video education. 

A sample 5th grade lesson, using this product is here.  

These products make it easy to provide a solid math education, without 

having to be a math expert.

During these years, I also introduced my daughter to:

- family finances,

- and introduced her to checking accounts, 

- how to balance a checkbook, 

- our household bills, etc.

HIGH SCHOOL

Doing homeschool math in high school.....Many of us are leery of that!

But with a solid homeschool math curriculum, I found it was not hard!

We began Algebra 1 in 9th grade, and we decided to try Teaching Textbooks for that.  

I liked how TT offered even more dvd help and we were happy using all their dvd's, especially the ones that explained errors in the practice problems.

photo credit - www.aop.com

Then in 10th grade,with 

the ACT/SAT 

testing coming up.....

we decided to switch to 

Alpha Omega 

Publication's 

Switched On Schoolhouse

.  

These were a bit more repetitive than the Teaching Textbook approach.  

That helped with retention.

I also loved how SOS was self-graded and included a video lectures for 

each lesson, plus lots of practice, and some hands-on math projects as well.

Living Math activities in high school centered on...


- getting and managing a savings account, 

- learning about taxes, 

- car insurance, 

- and compounding interest,

- as well as family budgeting.

As you can see, we used a wide variety of curriculum for math, through the 

years. What are your favorites for math in your house?  I love getting and 

reading your comments.

Thanks for stopping by BJ's Homeschool,

Betsy

Betsy is mom to her now college grad, whom she homeschooled through high school.  She blogs at BJ's Homeschool, about the early years, highschool, 
college, gifted/2e and wrote -Homeschooling High School with College in Mind, 2nd Edition,   She offers homeschool help through messages at BJ's Consulting,  and has had some of her articles picked up by the Huffington Post.

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