Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

We just finished book 1A with my 6- and 5-year olds. I am extremely impressed with the way the material in these books is presented. I have a very strong math background (was an engineer) and obviously did just fine learning the "traditional" way 20 years ago in public school. But the thoroughness and depth of understanding that this method fosters is something I don't remember ever being taught. I just "got it" and was good at math, while others in my classes struggled, but I really feel like this method (in the hands of a patient instructor) can help even struggling math students to "get it." I have one kid who got my abstract brain, and she breezes through the textbook and exercises and thinks that the concrete lessons from the instructor's guide are a bit unnecessary. She finds all the work fun and easy. But my 7-year-old, who is ridiculously concrete, really benefits from the concrete presentation of the concepts. In fact, the only reason I gave this 4 stars instead of 5 is that I wish the instructor's guide emphasized just how much some kids need a TON of concrete work before they start writing anything down. We really found that true in the "subtracting within 20 when there are not enough ones by subtracting from the ten" section (what we all learned as "borrowing," but they don't teach that method here). We used the 10-frames as recommended in the book, but my concrete learner didn't really "get it" until I made him a set of 10 beads on a string, with 10 "loose beads" so he could manipulate as he worked through problems. The only other complaint I have about this curriculum is also praise, I guess: the method (in the instructor's guide) very clearly outlines when students "ought to" have various math facts memorized, since later units will build upon these math facts. Their recommendations make sense and seem spot on for my gifted memorizer, who is "right on schedule." But there's no way my struggling one is going to have all math facts to 20 memorized before moving on to the next section - we will be drilling them until he is 20, probably, and that's just how his brain works, and there's no reason he can't move on to the next concept just because he still needs to count on his fingers or use manipulatives more than other kids. So I can see how Singapore Math's mastery approach (as opposed to a spiral approach like in Saxon Math) could be frustrating for kids who can't completely memorize what they need in each unit in time for the next unit, which builds upon that knowledge. But the concrete introduction of each concept makes new units approachable even without complete memorization of math facts.