RightStart Math has been the most successful part of our homeschooling endeavor from the beginning, the one piece I would never change or tweak. Not only does my son favor math, never tire of it, ask to do extra, etc., but his academic accomplishment with this curriculum has been outstanding. My son began Right Start A a month before he turned five. A year after beginning Right Start (and still age five), he tested at a third grade math level! He continually impresses us with his ability to mentally subtract four-digit numbers, even with trading/borrowing. Due to his visualization of the abacus, he also came up with logical strategies for all the multiplication tables, even before they were formally introduced. For example, he figured out on his own. at age seven, that any number multiplied by 5 would be half of the number multiplied by 10. I believe this is because he holds “the abacus in his head,” as Dr. Cotter says. This is actually my favorite aspect of the curriculum: Before a concept is formally introduced, my son already understands the foundations, because the mathematical concepts are understood, rather than algorithms memorized. He is always being pointed toward the next thing, implicitly. We are now working comfortably in the middle of Level D, and I continue to be grateful for RightStart Math, the best part of our homeschool day.
