Saxon Math 5/4 Homeschool: Complete Kit 3rd Edition: 3rd Edition Product Bundle – April 1, 2004

Saxon Math is one of the best Math curriculum that we have used over many years with many children. It's very thorough, well laid out, understandable instructions, introduces new concepts gradually and provides continual review.

We love Saxon for math. We have used it faithfully for all levels. Level 5/4 comes after Saxon 3. It is the fifth level (K, 1, 2, 3, 4) but 4th grade material, hence the 5/4. That’s my guess why it’s named this way. But I digress.My son LOVES this level and so do I! The format is great. It provides a good rhythm of independent and parent-coached work. The recording forms for each lesson are clear and my son loves the format.I strongly suggest reading the preface in the textbook as it outlines the program and it’s compnents clearly. I feel I will be getting the most out of the curriculum just doing what they suggest.There are some recording forms you are instructed to photocopy (legally). Tip: Our local library offers free photocopies. So I made the about 150 copies with tax dollars I’ve already paid. Score!What I LOVE the most is the solutions manual. It saves me so much time. (I wish levels 1-3 had solutions for fact sheets.) Some say you don’t need the full kit. I consider myself a frugal homeschooler, but I’m certainly no miser. I feel the full kit is worth it to streamline my time and my student’s time. Especially since I will use it with another child in my home.I feel like after the early math levels, this feels like a true upgrade. It makes sense to have the maturity of the format adjust at this point. Love.

We have purchased this for our 4th grader as it came highly recommended by our Classical Conversations community. I was a bit discouraged when I was browsing the web - it seemed confusing and hard to find the placement test and sample pages.. I finally just asked a friend for a direct link to purchase what I need (our kids are the same level).At first I was very dissapointed. We used Horizons Math before and loved it! I saw the reviews for Saxon stressed the frequent repetition of old topics as an advantage, and we got plenty of that with Horizons too. Horizons also was a lot more colorful (it was important for my child) and she could write directly in the book. Not with this book - you need to have a seperate note book where your student will copy the problems and write the answers. On top of that it looked like my girl (after finishing 3rd grade with Horizons) was WAY advanced for this textbook. She literaly laughed out loud when she saw Roman numerals introduced AT THE END of her new book.Well, we took a leap of faith anyway and started with the new curriculum. I did have her do 2 lessons in one day (I marked only half the problems for her to do, making sure she does all the important ones ;)). Lo and behold we are both in love - she gets a great boost of confidence because she is familiar with a lot of concepts and the fact that she can zip through the book so fast, doing 2 lessons at a time, she also gets an awesome review of the basics AND her mental math skills are just super improved!After about 3 weeks into it though I am feeling the need to slow down and keep it to a lesson a day and that's good too ;)I am optimistic about this math now, even though we both still miss Horizons :)

I use this for my 9 year old daughter (4th grade) to do math. She is not a big fan of math but she does not mind using this program. It is very well laid out and straight forward. For a parent who is not looking for a lot of prep work this is a good choice. You can just open and read the lessons to your kiddo. I like how each lesson work incorporates review. This allows the child to continually review what was previously studied thus making it "stick." The mental math is also a huge bonus. We had not previously practiced mental math so having my daughter do this was beneficial to her learning. I personally enjoy how the book is organized as well. In fact we liked Saxon math so much that my 13 year old (8th grade) was previously doing Math U See and we switched him to Saxon Algebra 1 and he is doing much better. Saxon really is the way to go for homeschool math.

I have used this series for homeschooling and all of my children have liked it. Okay, the math averse children tolerated it without frustration and the math lovers enjoyed it. Buying a new copy for the next child because my neuro-divergent kiddo wrote in it rather than doing the problems on notebook paper. Otherwise I've used these books with multiple children.

We had been using another excellent math curriculum but found that this one is a bit better as you get into high school. For this reason, I am going to cut over to Saxon at the 7th grade with this book going forward. Results with Saxon for my older children are excellent. The curriculum is rigorous and prepares the student for SATs and university. We use the Art Reed AND the Saxon Dive CDs to help illuminate and give further examples. With Saxon, your student will be well taught. Having said that, if no one in your home is comfortable with math, it would be helpful if you had just one person that you could run a problem or two by if the solutions key doesn't suffice. Otherwise, there is also the Saxon Teacher CDs which are lengthier and may give further instruction. The Art Reed and Dive are usually 8-12 minutes a piece and are sufficient for most student. I love this curriculum and have total confidence that it will prepare my students for any major requiring math, or give them a high school exposure that has the depth and breadth to be the last math that they will have if they pursue something in the Humanities.

Saxon math was a staple growing up. Not that it was the only thing that we did but it is something that stuck with me all throughout my life. Easy to understand and very straightforward. I ordered these books for one of my children to use this year and so far it has been a great help. Math doesn't change, and these books look to be the same as the ones I had growing up.