Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources Everyday Math, Common Core edition

Many school districts in Massachusetts, including ours, use Everyday Math (EM) as the elementary school math curriculum. The authors of EM have objected to the Common Core Math Standards http://pqme.org/uncategorized/everyday-math-objects-to-common-core-standards/ , but now that many states have adopted them, including MA, EM has come out with a Common Core edition of its curriculum http://everydaymath.uchicago.edu/teaching-topics/standards/ . I don't like EM much (it jumps around too much), but maybe the Common Core version will be a slight improvement.

Are there any schools that adapt EM to the needs of gifted students?

We use EM in our district too. In first grade, our teacher did pull outs of the gifted kids and adapted the games for them. Eventually, the kids were placed into the second grade math class. Needless to say, they repeated that second grade math this year

Our gifted program (with admission heavily weighted towards verbal skills, leaving aside many bored & talented math students) compacts 4-6 grade EM into grades 4-5. The gifted teacher said it was really easy to do by removing the repetition. I actually wonder if that will be harder or easier to do in Common Core.

The program starts much too late, and is much too inflexible as to who can participate, IMO.

FWIW, my reading of the CC standards looks really, really slow. I foresee more boredom, not less, for those kids quick to catch onto new concepts.

Our schools do the compacting of EM in grades 3-4. They complete 3-4-5 in 2 years and 6th grade is pre algebra 7th is algebra and 8th is geometry.

I'm not a huge fan of EDM. I have helped out in our 5th grade accel math classroom once a week for the past two years. I've taken home the teacher's manual a number of times to prepare for small-group work and there IS quite a bit on differentiation, but much more for the slower students. What there is for gifted is separate enough and complicated enough that I don't think most teachers have the time to do it.

I also was worried about CC, but I actually feel better now. I think it will go slower in some aspects, but it focuses much more heavily on problem solving. Our principal showed this video when he presented it:
http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_meyer_math_curriculum_makeover.html (one both my husband and I have seen and love)
and he said that this was going to be our district's focus. The 5th grade teacher with whom I've worked for the past two years is part of our common core team for accel math and she has really changed the way she teaches. She starts off each class with problems similar to AoPS (although hers come from the NCTM high school problems) and she is really teaching the kids to problem solve. I've already noticed the difference in their perseverance.
I think that the CC *can* be a huge improvement, in spite of having some math concepts now taught in 3rd or 4th, say, being moved to 5th. When I first heard that I was thinking, "oh my gosh, it's already too slow - this is a nightmare!" But, if it really, truly does go deeper not wider (I know, that phrase probably seems meaningless we've heard it so many times)... well, I'm willing to withhold judgement.

Just fyi, our accel math is 8th grade algebra and our gifted math is 7th grade algebra. That's as good as it gets here.

Our GATE school uses EM. The entire district adopted it about 5 years ago and the GATE school continued using Saxon math until a very vocal group of parents wondered why EM was good enough for their kids but not the GATE kids. So, they moved our school over to EM. It hasn't been horrible but they do supplement with Challenge Math and each child in this program is at least one grade level ahead at math.
I am hoping they will pick a new program when the 7 year contract is up and that my dd will only have 2 years of this program. I don't fully trust it but happily I do fully trust her teacher.

The standards don't spell out how deep is deep. Because of that, all is smoke and mirrors until the curriculum is chosen.

I haven't seen the new EM as redone for the CC. My experience with the previous version, though, is that providing differentiation was very difficult for teachers.

As far as I know, our elementary school hasn't chosen a new curriculum. The middle school one is achieving this "deeper, not wider" for kids through making it almost entirely online instruction, spelling disaster in our house.

Our school uses Everyday Math. My son is in the top math group of the second grade, where his teacher attempts to provide some differentiation, but I'm underwhelmed by the results of the program and the differentiation.

As far as I can tell, the spiral approach of EM is good for neither the fast nor the slow learners. I am hoping our district will move away from EM as they (imminently) adopt the Common Core.

DeeDee

We use Everyday Math- it seems muddled and confusing to me. I haven't been impressed by it. I have my kids do a page of Singapore Math, Kumon, or something else at home and just motor on ahead.