 Hi you guys, my name is Brittany and welcome back to my YouTube channel. You guys in today's video I am going to share with you my honest review after using Saxon math for 30 days So if you guys are interested in hearing about my review of Saxon math after we've used it for 30 days Then go ahead and stay tuned for Today's video. So if any of you guys are new here to my channel again, my name is Brittany I am a homeschooling mom to three girls ages 10 3 and 2 and I'm in my second year of homeschooling So you guys math has definitely been the heart subject in my homeschool I have definitely went on a math saga This school year if you guys have been following with me on my homeschooling update in my homeschooling journey You already know the story, but I will say I am so happy with Saxon math Um, it has definitely been working out very very well in my homeschool I know I still may be in the honeymoon phase of this curriculum However, I feel like after using this curriculum for about 30 days I know for sure that this is our fit and I cannot wait to share with you guys my honest review The pros about Saxon math and also some of the cons that I'm already seeing with Saxon math So you guys let's go ahead and get on into this review I'm going to flip you guys around I'm going to show you the inside and then I'm going to give you guys my overall review and our experience using Saxon math Okay, you guys this is Saxon math and when you purchase Saxon math, it comes in a set of three books I actually purchased Saxon math used because to buy this curriculum brand new it is $133 which is a really really expensive for a math curriculum as far as me So I was able to purchase this curriculum used. I believe I was able to get this student homeschool textbook portion for $22 used I purchased the test and the quiz worksheet brand new for $37 And then I was able to find the solutions manual used for about four dollars So I was able to save a lot by purchasing my Saxon math curriculum used And I definitely will say that is definitely one of the biggest cons about Saxon is the price But you guys I definitely will say if you want to try Saxon Definitely make sure you purchase it used and again You still will be able to utilize this program because I still feel like even though it's expensive It is honestly worth it. So let's go ahead and start off by going over the I guess we'll start by going inside of the Um test and the worksheet portion of the book Now the test and the worksheet portion of the book It has of course the test and the worksheets and it also has everything that you need for the investigations so Here we go. So Saxon math has 120 lessons 12 investigations and it has 22 tests That goes along with um Saxon math Um in the beginning of the Saxon math textbook it explains how you use the program And if you go if you are going to be using Saxon math, I would definitely recommend you Uh reading that first portion of it so you can figure out how these pieces work together So in the morning when my daughter comes to do her Saxon math, she will do her Fax fluency page and the fax fluency page varies between activities between addition Subtraction and as she gets further into the uh fax fluency, they do have other things This page right here was the activity that went with lesson three that had money in it. Um, We actually didn't use those money portions of it She actually had fake money to be able to use so I didn't have her cut out and do all the things with that So, um, again, here goes the addition practice that she does or that she did in the beginning And then it went on into the subtraction fact practice This again is another activity sheet that went along with one of her investigations again the investigations are Many activities that they put in throughout the course Just to solidify some of the concepts of their learning And again, this is just what she would do in the morning She will come set her timer and do her fax practice on the day of a test or an exam They also will have a fax practice as well. So here I'm going to flip to the back So you guys can kind of see some of the blank pages and how they look So again, the fax practice is just not addition subtraction. They do do division um, they do multiplication and then towards the end she's going to be Reducing fractions doing improper fractions. So the fax practice Is a variety of different skills that they are going to be practicing So in the back of this, uh, test and worksheet, of course has the test in it and hopefully I can Okay, there we go. It has a test in it Brielle actually completed test one through three No one through four because I only have test five right here. So she's going to be doing test five After um, I believe what is it after lesson 35? She does test five in the beginning of the saxon math book It does give you a schedule on when you will be giving the test to your students And again, the tests are very simple at the bottom portion of the test It does have a little number and this little number right here represents The lesson number that this problem specifically was on Which I really enjoyed because if my daughter did get anything wrong on her test I am able to know the lesson that she got it wrong Briefly read it go over it with her to make sure that was a concept That she didn't have any problems on so These are the rest of the tests that she's going to be doing throughout the year and again, there are 12 No 22 tests 12 investigations and 120 lessons. So a total of 155 days or lessons of um math So that's how that one works. So here is the main big boy Which is the saxon math textbook and again at the beginning of the saxon math textbook. It just goes over Um, all the the lessons and what is going to be taught in each lesson. It also goes over How to use the textbook and how to use each of the forms that they have So this is a really good portion for you as the parent to Go ahead and read and make sure you understand all the moving parts when it comes to um saxon math And right here is a list of the materials that you will need for the investigations I'm a lot of people say that saxon math is born and doesn't have any activities, which is totally false. They do have activities My daughter did the investigation for investigation two and she had so much fun I pulled out her uh fraction manipulative When she was learning about fractions and percentages and she really really enjoyed using these manipatives Along with the investigation and she really had a good time. Um doing that activity. So uh, they do have activities in here So here goes a example of how the lesson will go. Your kid will do the fax practice in the test and worksheets. Um Book they will do the mental math right here with you and then right here it goes straight on into the new concept It has the lesson practice right here and then the mix practice review and because this is the first lesson It's not going to have mixed practice from any old concept It's only going to go over the lesson practice that it just went over But as the lessons go on the practice does build upon each other in a very Thorough and systematic way. Um, how I do the practice for a burial is in the morning My daughter will do her fax practice and she will turn on nicole the math lady And nicole the math lady will go over the whole lesson with her Then after she turns off nicole the math lady, she will do her lesson practice She will do her mix practice even or the evens or the odds in the mix practice There is between 29 and 30 problems and with her doing half of it. She's only doing about 15 problems I will say coming from a becca to saxon was really a seamless transition because A becca arithmetic has similar moving parts where my daughter did a speed drill She would do her lesson or classroom practice and then she would do her mix practice So a becca and saxon it was really a seamless transition with her coming over to this curriculum I will say so because she was already used to those Moving parts and my daughter does thrive very well with a spiral based program So again, um, it's the same way as far as each lesson You have the fax practice the mental math the lesson practice I mean the lesson practice and then the mix practice now how I do it is Again, my daughter watches nicole the math lady to do her lesson the mix practice When I check her answers after I check her answers for her practice problems Then we will do our mental math together to end it off So my daughter is getting a break between doing her a fax practice Doing her lesson practice in the mental math It kind of gives her a break in between as she's doing all those moving parts in total together doing saxon math It takes my daughter 45 minutes to complete a saxon math lesson And then we work an additional 10 minutes to do our mental math practice together and for me to check Her answers now again as you see saxon is a math curriculum that you do not write in So my daughter she actually writes in this notebook that I actually purchased from schoolness I really really enjoyed the schoolness notebook Now I will say if you want to use the schoolness notebooks for saxon I would recommend just getting the mathematics notebook Not the primary mathematics notebook because the grit paper is going to be a little bit smaller in the mathematics notebook And it'll be easier for when it comes time for them to Graph versus this one because the the boxes are a little bit bigger But again, this notebook is very high quality. It's good. The pages is not going to fall out And it's the easy way for my daughter to Do her work So i'm going to go ahead and show you guys Some of my daughter's work and how she does it. I know a lot of people don't like to show their kids work However, I feel like it's so helpful when you see How a kid actually works on saxon. So my daughter again, she copies down her practice So like this set right here was for lesson one. So she did her practice right here from um There it goes. So she did this practice right here from the cold the math lady And as she gets further on into her lessons, you're going to see she is setting up her pages A lot better as she's labeling her lesson practice and her mix practice Now i'm going to show you guys um when my daughter does get a lot of problems wrong You're going to see what I do and hopefully I can find a page that she did. So Let's see Here we go. Okay. So on this lesson right here my daughter She actually did she got a lot wrong and she didn't really I felt like she really engrossed the concept That I wanted her to grasp which was subtraction with borrowing because she hasn't done it a while she kind of forgot it So what I did was I went in the mix practice And I wrote down some of the extra problems that I wanted her to do and I just labeled it extra practice And I had my daughter go through and do some extra problems So um when she doesn't do well on a lesson and if it's a concept I see she needs extra problems Will I will go back in and look at that mix practice and I will pick out some more problems for her to do In her lesson just to make sure she does understand it again sacks and math It is designed for going to do all 30 of the mix practice problems. However, uh, just for the sake of time and Um for the sake of st stamina, I don't want my daughter to be doing math that long So I definitely still make sure she does the evens or odds But if she does get a problem long, we will go back and do those problems, uh, together Sometimes we'll do those problems together on a white board But this is just again how she sets up each of her problems and as you guys can see my daughter She is thriving very well with sacks and again here goes a portion right here where She missed some of the problems. So I just set up some extra practice for her to do on this lesson But you guys it's just amazing seeing my daughter's growth in sacks and and how well she is doing and retaining The knowledge and I'm really really happy that I pulled the plug and I tried this curriculum And I'm just so happy it is working for her. So again, as you guys can see we ended off or we ended off on lesson 30 So right now you guys we have completed Four tests and we have completed two investigations within sacks So you guys I'm going to flip you guys around I'm going to give you my overall review sacks and and How I failed the pros and the cons Oh, you guys I forgot to show you before I flip you around I forgot to show you the last portion Which is the solutions manual and the solutions manual again It just has the answers for each of the problems and I love the solutions manual It actually shows out exactly how to get the problems the steps. It gives you everything Again, I bought this book you so it's turning colors But you guys it still has the answers in here and it has everything I need And this was just a way for me to save money by buying a used solutions manual. So yeah Okay, you guys So my pros of sacks and math is that I feel like the teaching instruction in sacks and it is very thorough I feel like it is written very simply for the student to understand and also for the parent to understand Especially when you're teaching higher levels of math Sometimes you may understand the concept, but it's hard for you to explain it So your child can understand and I love how simple the text is in sacks in One thing I can say about sacks is that it's a very tight spiral math Where they are going to be coming back around to those concepts constantly within their mixed practice Is which I really really love the lessons you guys they are very organized and they are very cleanly laid out You can really see the systematic way in which the concepts are being built upon themselves within sacks and math I really love the mental math portion in sacks and math Along with sacks and how they slowly and incrementally build on their concepts. That's the same way The mental math does and it's so crazy seeing my daughter's growth in mental math from lesson one Just to lesson 30 and I really love their approach not only to their mixed practice But also within their mental math Another thing that I really love is their facts practice. I really feel like a lot of curriculums are Losing that facts fluency or that flat facts practice being built in and I really think it's still important for a child to review Not only their multiplication and division facts, but also to go over those simple addition and subtraction facts My daughter has very well benefited from doing those speed drills and I know they can be redundant to some but I feel like the benefit has definitely outweighed the redundancy of her doing it She doesn't mind those fact fluency pages as you guys seen They only take between three and four minutes and I really think it's worth the time Now a way that you can break it up is you can do that facts fluency sheet Easily by using the app so instead of using the sheet you can use extra math Which is like a online app that does the fact fluency or you can just have them do the fact fluency At another time of the day so you can kind of break up that math lesson But I really think that that is something that you definitely don't want to skip when it comes to doing Saxon math another thing of it is that I feel like I really haven't heard that many people talk about the investigations My daughter did the investigation and she had an awesome time learning about fractions and percentages I had some manipulatives that I pulled out for her when she did that investigation And she really enjoyed it and a lot of people say, you know, saxon is dry It doesn't have any type of activities and and they're wrong The investigations are the activity portions within saxon and if you take the time to do it and especially have the supplies to do it It does break up those math lessons and it does incorporate something a little bit fun in your math days Another thing in the final thing out my final pro about saxon is that I really feel like it is a solid math program I really can see how Kids do so well with saxon I really see how kids are really able to grab a strong Concept or a strong fluency within math by using saxon consistently throughout the years Now with that being said I do have a few cons and my first con is that I really feel like saxon like everyone says It can be lengthy. However, I feel like it's a way to adjust the lengthiness of it Like again, you can break up the facts fluency into another part of your day Or like I do my daughter doesn't do all the problems within the mix practice We either do evens or odds and I'm still finding that she is gaining that fluency within math Now one thing I will say is a con is even by giving my daughters evens and odds Sometimes I still have to go back through the mix practice to make sure She is actually hitting on those problems that I see she's getting wrong to Do that and sometimes that does take time out for me to have to go and just make sure that She is doing the problems that I want her to do and I want her to practice. However That's just a little teeny bit of planning on my part for me Just to make sure I look at the lesson ahead the night before To make sure she's doing the problems that I know she needs a little bit more practice on And again the problem she already knows I can cross out as well So I really feel like the lengthiness of it and even though I'm not using the program how it's meant to be used I still feel like she definitely is benefiting from that practice Another thing that is a con for a lot of people is that saxon math is black and white. It's no frills It's not fancy But for me you guys That it's not really a con because my daughter actually told me she really loves uh, how the text is really really plain She likes to the straight to the point and some kids like my daughter They just do very well with the straight to the point math no frills no fluff and that is my daughter She really really enjoyed saxon and she told me she enjoyed it because of that She said it's not distracting to her and I didn't realize by giving her a colorful curriculum That that was distracting to her. So um, that can be a con for some but again It can be a pro for others in my case It is a pro with the pages being very very simple and clean and laid out And uh, the last con that a lot of people say is that it's a traditional math program It's math that's used in a public and private school system Um, it does align pretty closely with some of the common core standards and a lot of people when they're homeschooling They're not really looking for that type of math program But I will say you guys even though I listed some of the cons overall, I am very happy with saxon I'm very happy to continue my journey with saxon with my daughter. Um, I haven't seen her This confident in math in a long time. Um, she told me that she is feeling more confident with math She told me specifically to say Math is still not her favorite subject However, out of all of the math curriculums that she has tried Saxon is her favorite and she does not mind going in every day and doing math Now as far as nicole the math lady that we are utilizing as well You guys my daughter told me she really enjoys nicole the math lady. She enjoys her instructions If you guys see my day in a life video, uh, my daughter She specifically said that nicole the math lady does teach her better than I do and you guys I don't mind her saying that just because I rather her Get the instruction and understand it than for her trying to learn it from me So I am really enjoying this resource of nicole the math lady Other pros about nicole the math lady video lessons is you guys some video lessons like abeca and bju video lessons are very very expensive However, nicole the math ladies, um subscription is very affordable. I just have the basic subscription Which was 59 dollars for the whole year Another thing that I like about it too is that My daughter she may end up doing two levels of saxon this year because of the speed at which she's going through it And when she completes saxon six five and is ready to go on to saxon seven six All I have to do is switch to textbooks I will not be charged an additional fee with nicole the math lady from switching the textbooks when you pay that 59 dollars you are paying the 59 dollars for the basic Package you're paying it for the whole entire year She does offer online grading study halls and a variety of other resources on her website Um, I didn't need those uh you those resources However, um, if you do just definitely make sure you check out the website to see all the things that she has to offer Now with her videos you guys they are very basic. They're straight to the point. She's on a whiteboard. She's talking She's making jokes. It's nothing like frills as far as like big animations or uh, really visually pleasing Similar to the videos that my daughter was watching from the good and the beautiful. I mean, they're more updated They were Visually pleasing. Um, they had different uh things that they were bringing into their videos. It's nothing like that You guys nicole the math lady. She is at the board. She's doing the problem She's talking with the kids and she's like straight to it So, um, it is just very simple and thorough math instructions and again, nicole the math lady has three thumbs up I really enjoy it and i'm really happy to continue on Using her as a resource as is given my daughter the independence that she wants with math And it also is giving me extra time to work with my two preschoolers So i'm really happy of the independence that is given her and the freedom that is giving me to work with my other students So you guys that is my review for saxon math using it for 30 days I cannot wait to give you guys my end of the year review as we have completed it for our first semester Um, I know we might not get the whole saxon math done just because we just started it However, we probably will end off our year on lesson 60 at the rate that my daughter is going Which is really great because she would have made it halfway through this curriculum And i'm really proud of her and all the hard work. She is putting into it So you guys thank you so much for watching this video. I hope that it was helpful And as always I look forward to seeing everybody in my next one. Bye