I’m super psyched to share this Discover AIM by Math U See review today! I’ve been a fan of Math U See for years, so when I saw they released a new program specifically for teaching math facts I knew it was going to be amazing, and I was right!
This post is not sponsored.
Why I Love Math U See
Since our oldest son has ADD (without the hyperactivity factor), as well as dyscalculia (over 60% of people with adhd have a learning disorder like dyscalculia, dyspraxia, dyslexia, etc….), math started out on a bad foot in our homeschool.
YOU CAN LEARN ABOUT DYSCALCULIA HERE.
For five years we struggled to find a curriculum that would work for him. A couple years into it I thought I found a good curriculum. It seemed to be working for my son and our daughter too, but after a few months it just stopped working.
At first I thought it was my kids or my teaching, but after talking with a friend who was experiencing the same issues with the same curriculum we realized it was because the curriculum was very bright and colorful and had way too many problems packed onto each page which overwhelmed our kids eyes.
Eventually, I found Math U See. It was like a breath of fresh air!
By the time I found it my oldest (the one with dyscalculia) was settling into and enjoying Teaching Textbooks (which my older kids use-I would prefer they stay in Math U See but I give my kids the choice once they get to 3rd grade).
You can read our Teaching Textbooks review here.
So I started using Math U See for my early elementary kids when my oldest daughter was in second grade. I would have the oldest sit in on some lessons as well.
The program transformed math in our home! It took math from kind of a drag to a blast!
It helped our son with dyscalculia, and it gave our daughter an even stronger handle on math.
I don’t know if the next two kids that followed would have been natural with math regardless….but I believe Math U See has had something to do with their math success.
I am tremendously thankful for Math U See because of what the curriculum has done for my kids, and because it makes teaching and learning math easy and fun for us. I’m convinced it’s the best!
A Math Head Start
I’m always amazed at how early I can start using Math U See. Although I believe in waiting until around 6 for formal lessons-especially the boys (for very specific reasons that I’ll share in a future post), I love that we can get a head start with math because of how Math U See works.
Beginning at a very early age little ones are eager to play with the blocks, and so I enjoy starting to play math games with them to help them begin to familiarize themselves with the blocks which helps give them a head start when it’s time for formal lessons. Note; When they are very young they will need to be supervised or else you’ll need to take the small blocks out.
My kids start begging to begin Primer (Level 1) at around age 3 or 4.
We are careful to take our time going through it. I’m always amazed by the kids math processing skills as they are finishing Primer. You guys, this curriculum gives kids such a solid math foundation, and it makes little math wizes! It’s so fun to watch such little ones begin to understand and enjoy math!
Why Discover AIM by Math U See?
So because of our rocky start there is one weak area of math that has remained in our homeschool up till recently. Although my kids excel in mathematics concepts & problems and are at level and even ahead in this area, they struggle with computation for one reason. Two words. Math Facts. They hate them.
I don’t blame them. I used to hate teaching them. In fact, I hated teaching facts so badly that around 7 years ago I turned teaching them over to my husband.
Part of the reason why is the tediousness of teaching math facts. I’ve always felt like there had to be a better and faster way to learn them.
I researched so many ways to teach them through the years and every method I found was like two steps forward and one step back.
Nothing ever seemed to work for my child with dyscalculia (which is common with dyscalculia).
So I eventually couldn’t take it and I told my husband I quit and it was up to him to teach math facts.
The challenge was for my him was that it was hard for him to stay consistent with each one of the kids because he does work full time. Eventually he came up with a method that was working, but it was working slowly.
So as you can imagine, I was over the moon happy when I saw Math U See came up with a method and program for teaching math facts. I knew if it was going to be anything like the rest of their curriculum that it was going to be good. I was right!
I snagged AIM within 30 minutes after I saw they released the program.
We’ve been using AIM for two weeks now. To say we love it would be an understatement. Math U See has done it again. The way AIM is presented makes so much sense to us.
What Is AIM?
AIM stands for Accelerated Individualized Mastery. It’s designed to meet kids where they are at in their math facts memorization journey and help them succeed.
I love that as with all Math U See lessons there is a teacher that shows how to teach the short lessons, and that there is emphasis on how to help kids that have developed math anxiety.
It’s the perfect step by step math facts mastery program and is exactly what I’ve been searching for all these years!
Although AIM is designed to help kids struggling to learn their math facts, I’ll actually be using it to teach math facts to all of my remaining little learners, and I’ve already started my 4 year old on it since she is a third of the way through Math U See Primer.
The kids we have that were struggling with some facts are racing through the program.
I didn’t realize it was possible for kids to learn math facts as quickly as they have been. I know that I didn’t learn them this fast when I was a kid, and my husband who thought he learned them quickly as a kid is surprised at how fast the kids are learning them too.
We especially love that the kids math facts confidence is soaring.
Currently AIM covers addition and subtraction, I’m hoping they create multiplication and division version soon. In the meantime I think it would be fairly easy to use the process and create a DIY version for multiplication and division.
If you have a child struggling to memorize their math facts or if you just want the perfect program to teach the facts quickly I highly recommend AIM.
If you enjoyed Discover AIM by Math U See you might enjoy my other EDUCATION RELATED POSTS HERE.
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