Right Start math A or B?

[blondeviolin]

I'm looking into this curriculum for my soon to be 5-year-old for kindy. If it were just her I would do level B. But, I have an inkling my 3.5 yo will want to sit in. He is mathematically minded, however, and is just about on par with what she is doing number-wise. They haven't had any formal instruction... For Kindy curric we're only planning on reading lessons and some math. The rest will come from life lessons. 

With all of that said, should I get level A so that my son can do it with her? My daughter is the type to give up easily so if it comes easily than she'll feel more apt to work on it. My son is all about completing a challenge, though...so maybe B would be okay?

If you were me would you do A or B?

[luv my 2 sweeties]

Are you starting now or next fall?  If you are starting now, with an almost 5 year old, I'd go with A, and yes, the 3 1/2 year old will be able to participate on some level for a while with A.  (You'll undoubtedly skim the first few lessons with your older child. They start out *very* basic.) If you are going to start in the fall, and your older child will already be 5, then I'd consider level B.  I wouldn't automatically rule out A, though.  B covers everything in A, but ramps up to more difficult concepts much more quickly.  For a child who is easily discouraged, A might still be worth it.  My dd started with level A when she was still 4.  We only did lessons when she asked to at that point.  Even so, once we got to level B when she was 5, we still hit a developmental plateau for a while, where she was simply unable to grasp the concepts she needed to move on.  We just hung out for a while (a few weeks?), played games that had math concepts when we found them fun, and soon she had matured into the material.  If I were starting with 5 1/2 or 6 year old, I'd go straight to B unless the child found math concepts particularly difficult.  One thing to keep in mind is that Level C is particularly long and can be challenging for many children.  I would be careful not to get onto a track where you are tackling that too soon (like before age 7) unless you have a kid who is rather precocious in math. 

Hope that helps!  My oldest child completed Level E last year and has moved on to a pre-algebra curriculum.  My middle child is on Level D this year.  My youngest isn't doing math yet, but I'll use RightStart with him as well when the time comes. I think you will be very happy with RS!  It gives an excellent base in math understanding.  I can't recommend it highly enough!   Do you know about the yahoo support group for RightStart?  It's a great place to ask questions if you don't understand something in the curriculum or the purpose of a particular lesson.  You'll get pretty clear ideas about what really should be stuck with and what can be skipped with little consequence.  (I skipped the time-telling in level A with my son because he just wasn't interested at that time.  He learned to tell time later, informally.  It was not a problem at all.   Some other things would have been a problem to skip because later concepts are built upon them.) 

[blondeviolin]

Thanks Stephanie!  I think I'll start with A, but do it earlier than I thought.  Maybe I'll start sometime in February so we can take our time to go through A.  I didn't know there was a yahoo group, but I'll look through it!  

I'm very pleased with the reviews I've heard from RS math so I'm actually happy that I've found something that sounds so good.  :)

[tankgirl73]

Technically speaking, B is the "grade 1" book.  It was the original entry-level book, but people wanted a book for pre-elementary age, so Dr Cotter made level A as a kindy-level book.

Level A should be fine for a 5yo.  Level B is renowned for being wonderful, but then becoming suddenly quite challenging partway through... there's a period partway into B where many, many kids struggle for awhile before getting through it.  This is "normal" grade 1-level kids.  So for a 5yo, it might very well be too much.

There's absolutely no harm in doing level A even if level B would have been okay.  When you DO do level B, you can skip over -- or skim through quickly -- the first few handfuls of lessons which are just covering the same stuff as A.