TOS Review/ Pearson enVision Math Grade 1

• For one of my last reviews of the year, I was given the opportunity to review a first grade math program from Pearson, called enVisionMATH.

I was very excited to get this math program, as my son had just finished his kindergarten math book, and we would soon be needing a first grade math book.

I must say that from the get go,  I was very frustrated with this math program.

I don't usually start off a review like this, but this is probably the most frustrating product I have ever reviewed.
 
Let me tell you a little about this product before I get into why I am frustrated by it. Sometimes the reasons why someone else doesn't like a program may be just the reason someone else does like it, so stick with me, and make your own evaluation.

"Daily Problem-Based Interactive Math Learning followed by Visual Learning strategies deepen conceptual understanding by making meaningful connections for students and delivering strong, sequential visual/verbal connections through the Visual Learning Bridge in every lesson. Ongoing Diagnosis & Intervention and daily Data-Driven Differentiation ensure that enVisionMATH gives every student the opportunity to succeed." (Taken from the Pearson Website. )


Unfortunately there is not a lot of information on their website about their products.

I think this is partly because this program is intended for public schools. If you are a public school teacher, you can get access to samples, and training, that would help you to understand this program better.

I tried to find more information myself, but everything I found was geared towards public school teachers, and how to use your teacher materials, of which we received none.

I did find a site that gave a few samples of the interactive part of this program. The interactive part is synchronized with the student book. Unfortunately, we did not receive the digital part.

Here is a link to what I did find that may help you to understand the program a little better. 

I am having a hard time writing this review because I feel like I only got part of a complete program, and it is hard to tell you about a program when I only have one part of it.



As you can tell from the description, and the link above, this is an interactive program, but the only part that I received was the student workbook.

So I am going to tell you about the student workbook as the basis for my review.

The student workbook is a very beautiful workbook.

The workbook is HUGE!!! It is 14 x 11 inches!

What you do is tear out the large page, fold it in half, and it then becomes a four page booklet.

Because of it's size, it is really inconvenient.  It is almost impossible to take with you anywhere. It is very hard to store, and I am sorry, but it is just a big ol' pain.

So, what I have done is to tear out a couple of chapters worth, and go ahead and fold them into their booklets, so we don't have to tote around that big workbook everyday.

OK, on to the content of the workbook pages.

The first page of every booklet is an Interactive-Learning page.

There is no way, as the parent, to know what you are supposed to do on this page without the interactive part, or at least a Teachers Manual.

But since we did not receive the interactive part, we just have to skip this page.

I thought I could just look at it and figure out something to do there, but on some of the pages I can't tell what it is supposed to be about, and on the ones that I can figure out, it is just too much trouble.

So we just move on the next page.

The two inside pages, are similar to a typical math book.

The first page is guided practice, and the second is independent practice.

The back page is the Problem solving page. Almost like a little review of the booklet.

There are a lot more word problems in this math program than the typical math book.

I can see the benefit in having word problems, as we use a lot of math word problems in daily life.

This program uses a lot of manipulatives, of which we also did not receive, but my son does not like using manipulatives anyways, so he wouldn't have liked that part.

There are a lot of problems that ask the child to draw the manipulatives.

We just skip these, because my son and I feel they are redundant. They already use a lot of manipulates, why make them draw them too?

You know, I find we are skipping a lot in this program.

It is a lot of repetition of what we already learned in kindergarten.

There are 647 pages in this math book!

It would take you 2 years to to finish this book if you were to do one booklet, 4 pages, a day.

If you wanted to finish this book in one year, you would need to do two booklets, or 8 pages a day, or pick and choose certain pages to do.

There is a lot of good math, but also a lot of repetition.

I know this is made for public schools, and they don't finish the whole book, so I guess we could just do every other lesson or something.

I hate to have it just go to waste, but I also don't know if it is too behind where my son is.

It seems a little behind compared to the math programs I have seen.

On the other hand it is very important to have enough review in the early years so that they have a strong foundation.

I know that this review is probably not all that helpful, but I am just being honest, and honestly I am confused on some of this.

If I were to have had the complete program, it may have been better, but there are still too many pages to complete this program in a year, and the size of the book is a big problem.

I think, honestly, that this program is not suited for homeschoolers.

I also know that there may be some of you who may like some of the things that I see as a problem.

If you have a student that you have recently pulled out of school, this may be a great option for you, as your child would be used to this type of program.  You would need the Teachers Manual though.

There are 19 other ladies from the Crew who also reviewed this math book, so I urge you to read their reviews as well to see what they thought of this program. I am just one opinion, and I know my opinion on this program has not been all that favorable. So please read the rest of the reviews to get a more well rounded idea of the program.

If you think this might be a good fit for your child, you can purchase the Student Edition with Digital Access,  is $34.47.

Be sure to check out what my fellow Crew Mates thought of enVision math, and the other Pearson products.

 



*I have received a student math workbook from Pearson, free, as a member of the TOS Homeschool Review Crew, in return for my honest opinion.
No other compensation has been given to me.*