CTCMath - A Crew Review

Math. My nemesis. I kid of course, but truthfully, there has been no other subject that has caused me as much grief, both as a student and teacher, than Math. I feel as if we have sampled at least a dozen programs and/or curriculums available, with varying degrees of success. It seems that I'm on a continual quest for that perfect fit, and as such, I never pass up an opportunity to try out new resources. We had the chance to do just that when CTCMath generously provided us with a 12 month Family Membership to their online Math curriculum.
CTCMath is suitable for students in the K-12 grade range, which basically means everyone. The program is flexible, and may be used as a stand alone math curriculum, supplement, or tutor. Students learn at their own pace, so children or teens that struggle to retain math concepts can work at a slower pace, and those who desire to, may work ahead. Pat Murray is the instructor for this course, and with ten children of his own, has some solid parenting and homeschooling experience. Oh, and his lengthy years of teaching high school are a help as well. His math programs have been shared with students through the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and other countries. 
The point behind the lessons is fairly simple, keep it short and sweet. Murray believes that most programs spend too much time explaining the lesson, thereby boring students, whereas a short and concise teaching time is more effective. He prefers to keep lessons within a 5 minute time frame, and then provide students with the chance to practice the concepts. That aspect was a big draw for both my daughters and for me. We prefer any lesson, no matter the subject, to get to the point.
Getting started is simple. Instructions are easy to follow to get your account set up, and there are plenty of helpful videos that will assist you in becoming familiar with the program. Placement tests are available if you need help in  determining which level to place your child or teen. You can also decide what percentage of correct answers are required to pass a section. We set our requirement as 80% correct to pass. There are separate accounts for both students and teachers. Parents will have access to all activity. Everything is broken down in an organized manner. You will be able to see when your child logged in, which concept was attempted and/or passed, the percentage achieved, and what is still ahead to master. 


Instructional videos

More Videos

Adjust your preferred settings

Detailed progress reports

For the lessons themselves, students can get on themselves and work through it independently, but if you or they would like a little more help, there is a lesson summary on the lesson page that can be clicked on and brought up. On that same page, you can also bring up the page of questions to be  answered, as well as the solutions, and those are available as PDF's. Detailed reports are included, that track every lesson that has been taken, which is wonderful for your record keeping needs. A new feature for CTCMath ids the Question Bank Wizard, which allows you to create your own sheets for students. While creating these, you can decide how many questions will be used, as well as how easy or difficult they will be. As students successfully complete sections, they are awarded badges from bronze to gold.


Lesson in progress

Lesson in progress

Lesson summary

Practice questions

Worksheets

Solutions

All done? Try a game to practice skills

This past month or so has not been our first experience with this program, We've used it for several years. We have appreciated the shorter, to the point lessons. We also happen to love Murray's Australian accent, particularly the way he says "Twelve", and "Good luck with your questions", lol. This is a fantastic option for families with children in  larger grade range, as the levels span everything from early addition and on up to calculus. There are only two minor things that I would comment on. I would love to see Murray use at least one more difficult problem as an example when teaching a concept, as he uses simple ones. There are times when my kids get the basic concept, but then a trickier problem comes up and we can't get our mind around it. The second would be to not only mark a problem wrong when answered incorrectly, but to show where the problem went wrong, and how it should have been worked. Both of my teens, as well as myself, understand math problems better when we can see why we went wrong. 



So, what do we think? CTCMath is an excellent program, and is one that we highly recommend. Are you interested? You can visit their website, and get set up with a FREE TRIAL to see if this will be a good fit. Go on and click on the links!



Find CTCMath on social media: Facebook Twitter Pinterest YouTube Instagram




Read more Crew reviews by clicking on the banner below!