Review by The Old Homeschool Magazine Patterns In Arithmetic First Grade set
Patterns in Arithmetic: elementary math for mindful learning – First to Fifth grade Review by Melissa Bontadelli
Alysia Krafel, Suki Glenn, and Susan Carpenter
Pattern Press
P.O. Box 2737
Fallbrook, CA 92028
https://www.patternpress.com
Patterns in Arithmetic: elementary math for mindful learning is a math curriculum for elementary aged students. There are student and teacher workbooks that can be purchased by unit or for an entire year. There are four Student Workbooks in the first-grade set that include general math, addition, subtraction, and place value. Each booklet comes with a corresponding Parent/Teacher guide. The booklets range in price from twelve dollars to fourteen dollars. The cost for a full year would be fifty-one dollars. There are around fifteen lessons per booklet with several sessions associated with each lesson. In addition to the booklet, you will need a few basic items that are typical to most households. The only item that was specific to mathematics was the Cuisenaire Rods. When you reach the third-grade books, there are more books and that continues into fourth and fifth grades.
Patterns in Arithmetic is a full math curriculum and covers grades one through five. In our setting, I used the first-grade booklets with my first-grade student as their daily math work. The curriculum used a lot of game play and manipulatives. It works very well in a homeschool environment. The section on patterns was well done and we stayed in that area for a while. The curriculum had a quite different feel. Because of the layout of the booklets, it did not feel like you had to do an exact amount of work each day and really focused on the mastery and understanding.
This product worked well in our school. My student really enjoyed how completely different this math curriculum was from what he had done previously. Because of its unique approach, I found some gaps in knowledge that we were able to address. Although he is generally a student who enjoys math, he seemed to take an extra delight in the lessons.
The product is a very comparably priced product for math curriculum. It is beneficial that you can break it down into four different booklets so that if you wanted to do another curriculum and supplement with Patterns in Arithmetic, you could. Each booklet is independent from the others but does carry some of the same themes and games from booklet to booklet.
Personally, I found that matching the sections of the Parent/Teacher guide to the Student Workbook difficult. This improved the more I used the curriculum, but I really struggled at first. It does take some preparation work to use the curriculum effectively. The booklets are just paper booklets, so wear and tear could be an issue.
I would recommend using Patterns in Arithmetic: elementary math for mindful learning. The experience made me feel like we were more well-rounded in math and it deepened my students understanding. The whole curriculum is well thought out and is extremely well liked in our homeschool.
Product review by Melissa Bontadelli, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, July 2020
