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Post a message or simply read what others have written and answered. Rachel, a RightStart™ Math user and one of our customer care people, will be monitoring this forum. She will respond to your questions as needed.

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Re: Moving from level A to B

Hi, Kathryn. My name is Rachel and I am happy to help you today.

Starting at Lesson 13, Dr. Cotter starts sprinkling in new information. You will still be reviewing a little, but many of the activities will be new. If you are starting right in Level B, you may want to plan on doing a couple lessons a day for a while and skip sections you know your child knows - or review one or two 'samples' just be be sure your child has a good grasp on the topic.

I hope that helps!
Rachel

Re: Moving from level A to B

I just posted about this on the yahoogroup RightStart forum... The transition between the levels really needs to be improved (or changed altogether).

We just started B after finishing A. The table of contents for level B actually tells you which lessons to skip and it's the first 22 or 23, as I recall. But as Rachel said, there is new stuff sprinkled here and there in those "supposed to be skipped" lesson. Not just ath stuff but important information for the parents, like, for instance, the instructions on where to find the math journal.

And then once you're beyond those first couple dozen lessons, the next dozen or so are still half composed of things already covered in A. But it's not mere review, it's the very same lesson all over again.

Of course you can say 'skip the stuff you already know and combine lessons', and yes that's what we're doing, but that does bring in some additional problems. Like, the 'warmups' are designed with a particular progression and combining lessons sometimes means a concept being practiced in the warmups is only practiced for 2 days instead of the week it was designed with, and maybe that's not enough practice or moving too quickly through the concept.

I understand the reason why there's so much overlap (A was created later as a 'pre' level after B was already a 'beginning' level). My complaint is that IF you are going to give instructions on how to make the transition smooth, then those instructions should be accurate, and complete. As it is, we can NOT simply skip the lessons we're told to, and there is still too much repetition after that as well.

My suggestions would be that either 1) get rid of the suggested skips entirely and just say "skip stuff you already know and feel free to do the repeated lessons if you think you need reinforcement of that concept."

Or, 2) redesign the A and B entry levels entirely. Keep B, the original entry level, as is. But make a NEW level -- whatever you want to call it -- which is the followup to A. It would cover the material of level B without the repetition, and maybe even further adjust scope and sequence for the benefit of a younger student, if needed.

In other words... an average 6 year old would start in level B and take 1 year with it (more or less). A keener 4 and 5 year old, though, would take the option of a 2-year coverage of the material.

Anyway, it's certainly manageable right now, it's just not as clear and efficient for the parents as it could be, and can indeed be quite confusing!