Log Cabin Schoolhouse

Beast Academy as a Homeschool Co-op?

Where are all the Honors Math Programs for Homeschoolers?

It’s time to host an elementary school Honors Math class!

Yes!

I seriously cannot wait until this Fall for this class to start! Please come along for the ride so we can start a movement in our homeschooling communities because we have a lot of brilliant kids among us!

What if we could gather 8-10 kids and walk them through math as a gang? What if after that we could, as a team, conquer Art of Problem Solving Pre-Algebra? Yes, AOPS for any mom! I see teamwork as a way to raise the bar for more of our kids.

There are already ways to get great math advice in homeschooling circles. Currently, we can hire tutors, send our kids to Mathnasiams, send them to a co-op, or do online classes. But what about an actual honors class that will really push the love of mathematics to any child? Let’s grab a curriculum that goes deeper than any other and gather kids and their moms and really dive deeply! We can do this!

I took to the home school pages on Facebook a few weeks back searching for other teaching plans for this idea and low and behold I think I’ve stumbled onto a new idea… Some people even said, “Please keep me in the loop if you try it …” We collectively tend to fear math, but I beg you to join me and believe in ourselves. I want to see the bar for homeschool math raised, and I want us to do it one day at a time…

I’m going to map out my thoughts here and I’ll come back as the year progresses and update this post as I grow this class. I’ll be learning ways to teach this class as I go through this school year with my first group of kids. I’d love for other mama’s to join me and tell me their thoughts as well!

First of all, did you know that angles in geometry and trigonometry were named after the angels that ancient sailors believed were guiding their ships? Math has a fun story! Get to know it from a different perspective if the one you’re coming from isn’t working – or even if it’s working, but you also want to raise the bar.

Curriculum: There are two curriculum choices on the market that dive deeply; Beast Academy and Singapore. The first has levels 2-5 created as of the current date. BA is the leader in diving deep, almost to the exclusion of repetition work which some kids need. Critical thinking skills abound wihtin this program. Singapore has K-6 like most programs. It walks smoothly through the skills learned in elementary math with some repetition, but not spiral repetition. So it’s actually a great workbook to pair with BA. In my first bash at this idea I’d recommend BA as a primary spine with Singapore or Prodigy, which I’ll address below, for the added repetition a child may need. (I’d love to have a list of BA chapters aligned with Singapore chapters if anyone has done that yet.)

Supplements: Places that I’ll find teaching resources to supplement the primary spine:

  • Math Antics – This is, IMO, the BEST place to find videos to show any elementary topic in a fun way to your child.
  • Khan Academy – Most people have heard of Khan. It’s very thorough! More thorough than Math Antics, but not as fun and colorful. Definitely a great choice to explain content.
  • Prodigy Game – This game is a colorful, fun game that my kids say is a cross between Pokemon, Zelda, and Khan Academy. Mom can select what standards she wants to see her child learning. Then Prodigy tests the child out of skills they know and reveals what they don’t know. It doesn’t have videos explaining content. You have to go to Math Antics or Khan for that. Then send them back into Prodigy to “play” through the content you just revisited with them by assigning quizes. I have a post explaining more on Prodigy HERE.

Agenda for class:

  • Read the comic aloud, like Reader’s Theater, after handing out character assignments. Funny voices mandatory!
  • White board lesson on weekly topic. Simple handout or workbook page in class.
  • Assign a prodigy buddy for the week and homework.
  • Games. Addition Facts/Subtraction Facts/Multiplication Facts Around the World each week. I’ll do a separate post eventually on great classroom math games.

Where are you headed? Do you have a K-12 math path for your kids?

No it doesn’t have to be solid. It just has to exist to be altered along your journey.

Here’s mine for my 3rd grader.

So tell me what you all think? If you’re local, join me!

Jen at Log Cabin Schoolhouse

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