Both my son and I, are loving our RightStart Math program. What a great way to present Math to young kids. Having a bachelor’s in Mathematical Science, I can totally appreciate the amount of research Dr. Cotter and Activities for Learning have put into developing this curriculum targeted specifically for children.
RightStart Math discourages counting, relying rather on mental strategies to understand the concepts. If the child already has a grasp on the material, the methodology presented will allow him to go even deeper. Rote memorization is a no-no, emphasizing cementing addition (and later subtraction, multiplication, etc.) facts by using the abacus, other manipulatives and playing games. Which child doesn’t want to play games? My son often begs to play one more time, please. It’s so well organized, the appendices and manipulatives are top-notch in terms of both, design and quality.
The parent manual is so straight forward and easy to follow. It shows you what to say, how to say it, when to say it. The worksheets for the child are few and far between. I appreciate this immensely as my son usually hates worksheets (and so do I). With RightStart Math’s worksheets, however, he’s never complained. They are brief and to the point, never oh-so-boring!
My son loves Math so much, he first asked me to switch Math before Phonics/Reading. And now that we do Math first, but after Moving Beyond the Page, our core curriculum, he occasionally foregoes his break wanting to move straight into it. Fine by me, RightStart Math is my favorite part of the day too!
Here he is playing “handshake’ with his dinosaur toys and ‘go to the dump’ where he reinforces addition facts up to 10. He loves dinosaurs, no need to tell him twice to get out his dino friends to learn Math!
