The last 3 days have been beyond busy in our household, and likely your household can relate.  Hubby and I actually laughed when we looked over the calendar as there was literally nowhere to pause until the day ended at a late hour.  In the midst of the activities, I’ve tried to keep an abbreviated version of academics going as every little bit helps.

In the wee hours of the night, I was prepping for our lessons that were to be taught today when I found myself becoming anxious over my fifth grader’s math and questioning my ability to teach this.  Yes, fifth grade math!  I’m using Singapore’s “Math in Focus” as our skeleton math curriculum and some of the word problems in the extra practice and enrichment books I’ve been frustrated with.  I don’t feel the authors have done a decent job of explaining how to present a few of the concepts.  This belief led me down that not-so-fun road of asking the question, “Do I throw in the towel on this curriculum and go back to what I was using before (Calvert Math), or do I persevere with what I’m presently using?” Math is such an important subject so I want to make sure it gets the time and attention it deserves, and that I’m comfortable in teaching it.  My latest thought is to combine Calvert’s Math and Singapore’s books and teach the concepts using both of their resources and methodologies, which just means more work for me-ugh.  But you just do what you have to do to make it work.  Hopefully, I”m making the right decision.  We’ll see how his next round of standardized testing goes.