If the Beast Academy doesn't review concepts already taught you can have the kid pause the program do a review and keep going...I personally don't care if they review or not, I just want my kids to learn or be exposed to math. Honestly who of ALL of us truly remember what was taught in school and uses it constantly.....
TGTB is how I was taught in school but Beast Academy is how my son thinks. I'm pretty much just winging it this year. He is supposed to be in third grade but he tested into 4th. So I just decided to try level 3 BA and supplement with the unit tests from TGTB 3 for holes while adding in mental math from level 4. 🤷♀ The one thing I did notice so far is that BA online seems way easier than the correspoding BA workbooks.
I can't say enough good about it about Beast Academy, as I teach my son I'm learning to take interest in math and not be afraid of it for the first time. He loves BA and although he is gifted math, I think anyone could benefit from it if you start at the right level. I've also dabbled with TGATB math and it's a nice course, some of my friend's use it exclusively and love it but for us Beast Academy takes the cake.
We did Beast Academy last year and through the summer. I love it but my kids feel it is a little tough at times (I even struggle helping them on some really hard questions). The only issue I have with it is the lack of review. Also, it seems to have a different schedule of learning and it makes me feel like we are behind in learning. example: points, rays, segments aren't even covered until level 4. There isn't an emphasis on measurements either so I feel like I need to find extra teaching/practice on that. I think for this year I am going to continue Beast Academy and add some selected lessons and/or review pages from Good and Beautiful from the free PDF version.
I agree with you 100% on everything you said. My friend however had her kids finish it and they jumped into pre algebra just fine. And I don’t think she added to it. But all of your reasons are why we switched to TGTB
Hey Vani 👋🏾! Thanks for doing this comparison. We used TGATB, but was thinking about changing curriculum. I was told about Beast Academy bc my 6 yr old son seems to get bored with TGATB. But, I like the spiral method too! My son retains more this way too. Plus, he loves the characters and the manipulative. If I stay with TGATB, I’m thinking of printing it out myself this year. I’ve been looking into Apologia and MasterBooks Math too. So many decisions 😂 thanks again.
My 2 cents, unless you have a great color printer, do not print tgatb. Just buy it if you can afford it, the artwork is so beautiful. As for masterbooks, I keep hearing the math is really last resort as it is not enough practice. Although ... I understand they have additional practice books so perhaps if you do the main book plus the additional practice, perhaps then it is enough?? Good luck!!
Gosh so funny you made this video so recently! My son started the year with Beast Academy Level 3 online. At first he liked it but then started hating how challenging it was. Wanted something like "how we used to do in school!" So midyear we switched to TGATB. He didn't love it but was doing much better (less complaining). We are almost done with it, as i had him start from Lesson 1 in January. But now he's starting to complain about the spiral approach, he wants more practice on new concept and a little less on spiral. (When he was in public school, go math had like 10 problems on new topic and then only 6 spiral problems). Anyhow, I don't mind the spiral approach, I like that it revisits topics. And it is so stinkin beautiful!!! Something in my head made me ask him today to try a lesson in the physical workbook for Beast Academy. I don't know if it's the change or if truly is more engaging for him, but he is now saying he'd rather go back to Beast but with the physical workbooks only, the online gave him too much pressure somehow. At least the workbooks tell you which problems are the super hard ones with the asterisk so you can easily avoid them if you want to. So now I'm looking at both books and I'm just not sure what to do. It's basically what you said ... do Beast and he'll have a deep understanding of math or do the very beautiful TGATB and learn everything he "needs" to learn and get lots of practice under the spiral approach. We grew up on the mastery approach, I think and it seemed to have worked! What oh what do I do? I wish I could do both haha!!!
Great comparison. I think for most kids, The Good and The Beautiful is about as good as it gets. Yes, there are a lot of problems and repeating material already covered, but this is absolutely necessary. Repetition in math is key to remembering and understanding the material. If it isn't done, progressing to the next concept will be difficult and kids will eventually become dejected. Math is a subject in which new concepts are built on top of the foundation laid by the previous ones. I think this is why public schools resoundingly fail at teaching math for most kids - the one size fits all approach does not identify the areas where kids need additional help. As homeschool parents we can intervene and make sure our children have a solid understanding of a concept before moving on. I've grown to trust the program - it is a masterfully designed curriculum and it really works well.
you will need one workbook for each child unless you want to make copies of the pages or rewrite the problems on a white board or something. They can however share the manipulatives assuming they are doing math at different times.
If the Beast Academy doesn't review concepts already taught you can have the kid pause the program do a review and keep going...I personally don't care if they review or not, I just want my kids to learn or be exposed to math. Honestly who of ALL of us truly remember what was taught in school and uses it constantly.....
So true
TGTB is how I was taught in school but Beast Academy is how my son thinks. I'm pretty much just winging it this year. He is supposed to be in third grade but he tested into 4th. So I just decided to try level 3 BA and supplement with the unit tests from TGTB 3 for holes while adding in mental math from level 4. 🤷♀ The one thing I did notice so far is that BA online seems way easier than the correspoding BA workbooks.
I can't say enough good about it about Beast Academy, as I teach my son I'm learning to take interest in math and not be afraid of it for the first time. He loves BA and although he is gifted math, I think anyone could benefit from it if you start at the right level. I've also dabbled with TGATB math and it's a nice course, some of my friend's use it exclusively and love it but for us Beast Academy takes the cake.
I loved it too. I love both programs. I’m glad it works for your son 😊
We did Beast Academy last year and through the summer. I love it but my kids feel it is a little tough at times (I even struggle helping them on some really hard questions). The only issue I have with it is the lack of review. Also, it seems to have a different schedule of learning and it makes me feel like we are behind in learning. example: points, rays, segments aren't even covered until level 4. There isn't an emphasis on measurements either so I feel like I need to find extra teaching/practice on that. I think for this year I am going to continue Beast Academy and add some selected lessons and/or review pages from Good and Beautiful from the free PDF version.
I agree with you 100% on everything you said. My friend however had her kids finish it and they jumped into pre algebra just fine. And I don’t think she added to it. But all of your reasons are why we switched to TGTB
Hey Vani 👋🏾! Thanks for doing this comparison. We used TGATB, but was thinking about changing curriculum. I was told about Beast Academy bc my 6 yr old son seems to get bored with TGATB. But, I like the spiral method too! My son retains more this way too. Plus, he loves the characters and the manipulative. If I stay with TGATB, I’m thinking of printing it out myself this year. I’ve been looking into Apologia and MasterBooks Math too. So many decisions 😂 thanks again.
OMg I know it’s like you just have to commit bc there’s so much good out there
My 2 cents, unless you have a great color printer, do not print tgatb. Just buy it if you can afford it, the artwork is so beautiful.
As for masterbooks, I keep hearing the math is really last resort as it is not enough practice. Although ... I understand they have additional practice books so perhaps if you do the main book plus the additional practice, perhaps then it is enough?? Good luck!!
@@AKadiev thanks for this info. I will pass it on if needed 😊 best of luck!
Gosh so funny you made this video so recently! My son started the year with Beast Academy Level 3 online. At first he liked it but then started hating how challenging it was. Wanted something like "how we used to do in school!" So midyear we switched to TGATB. He didn't love it but was doing much better (less complaining). We are almost done with it, as i had him start from Lesson 1 in January. But now he's starting to complain about the spiral approach, he wants more practice on new concept and a little less on spiral. (When he was in public school, go math had like 10 problems on new topic and then only 6 spiral problems). Anyhow, I don't mind the spiral approach, I like that it revisits topics. And it is so stinkin beautiful!!!
Something in my head made me ask him today to try a lesson in the physical workbook for Beast Academy. I don't know if it's the change or if truly is more engaging for him, but he is now saying he'd rather go back to Beast but with the physical workbooks only, the online gave him too much pressure somehow. At least the workbooks tell you which problems are the super hard ones with the asterisk so you can easily avoid them if you want to.
So now I'm looking at both books and I'm just not sure what to do. It's basically what you said ... do Beast and he'll have a deep understanding of math or do the very beautiful TGATB and learn everything he "needs" to learn and get lots of practice under the spiral approach.
We grew up on the mastery approach, I think and it seemed to have worked!
What oh what do I do? I wish I could do both haha!!!
I hope you find your answer without giving him three hours of math a day! Lol. Jk you’ll figure it out 😊
Great comparison. I think for most kids, The Good and The Beautiful is about as good as it gets. Yes, there are a lot of problems and repeating material already covered, but this is absolutely necessary. Repetition in math is key to remembering and understanding the material. If it isn't done, progressing to the next concept will be difficult and kids will eventually become dejected. Math is a subject in which new concepts are built on top of the foundation laid by the previous ones. I think this is why public schools resoundingly fail at teaching math for most kids - the one size fits all approach does not identify the areas where kids need additional help. As homeschool parents we can intervene and make sure our children have a solid understanding of a concept before moving on.
I've grown to trust the program - it is a masterfully designed curriculum and it really works well.
You are so right about all of this. I really love TGTB math it works so well for my kids.
Can the workbooks from good and beautiful be used for more than one child at the same time with only one set of manipulatives?
you will need one workbook for each child unless you want to make copies of the pages or rewrite the problems on a white board or something. They can however share the manipulatives assuming they are doing math at different times.