quote:

Originally posted by deannatoby:
I have switched from Saxon to RightStart. I am actually still a fan of Saxon. I know high school kids who have graduated under Saxon, and, boy, they have some serious math skills. But, that style of math made my elementary child hate math, even though she was good at it. She was only 6, and already the math love was sucked right out of her. I'm a math major, and I knew we could make it more appealing and yet still rigorous for the younger child. I chose RightStart. My thoughts:

RightStart's strengths:
(1) It is an almost total hands-on approach to learning.
(2) Its use of the abacus makes mental math easy to learn and do.
(3) It has effective and fun card games to reinforce concepts.
(4) The closest that comes to it is Math-U-See. It's strength over Math-U-See seems to be (from others who know better than I) that Math-U-See (a GREAT program) uses manipulatives to help make abstract concepts make sense, whereas RightStart takes the abstract much closer to the concrete. I felt Math-U-See was a more manipulative-based way to do Saxon, or worksheet math, whereas RightStart was "making math real." Standard algorithms don't rule in RightStart. Rather, it makes the process of computing a more natural thing.

RightStart's weaknesses are
(1) It is very very very mom-intensive, not just in preparation (my prep time is fine, but with others it can be longer), but in lesson time with the student. For families with multiple children, its time commitment will be a problem unless older children can teach younger children.
(3) Sometimes it seems that the book hasn't been revised. It will list a material as needed in a lesson, and then nowhere is the material used, or alluded to, and it seems unnecessary once you've thought about it. In addition, I have on occasion thought a part of a lessons was vague. Each lesson fits on two pages, and perhaps to make everything fit there has occasionally been a sacrifice of text.
(2) Its cost is high, and undefendable, in my opinion. I'm very happy with RightStart, but their markup on standard manipulatives is excessive. In addition, the cost of their manual is completely unjustified. What kind of professional printer are they using? The cost per 2-sided page in B&W for a Level C workbook computes to 12.5 cents. WHAT?! The books are black and white only, no frills, done on standard paper, not glossy, with Kinko's spiral binding, and yet the cost matches that of Saxon, whose manual is 4 times the size. You COULD buy all the workbooks on CD, but that costs $26? (I think) more than the physical workbooks, and you have to pay your printing costs. Again, WHAT?! In business meetings, perhaps their motto is "sock-it-to-'em." Although I like RightStart, I feel that I am financing a few healthy retirement accounts. It is understandable that people are chased away from RigthStart because of the price.

Those first and third weaknesses are BIG. If you offer RightStart, make sure people understand that it requires time committments from Mom, and that the cost is high. If I were you, I would even redirect people to other sources for manipulatives at a cheaper price (like Rainbow Resources, which also offers free shipping over a certain $). For those not wanting to invest in the full curriculum, I would HIGHLY recommend the Math games, which work with ANY curriculum, and would recommend the separate book containing exercises with the abacus, which works with any program where Mom can invest the extra time.

My thoughts. I really like RightStart. I'm a happy RightStart user. It is so very much what I was looking for in a math program. But, the weaknesses, two of which could be easily addressed by the publisher, should be clearly understood by the purchaser.

Deanna