Critical Thinking Press, three books for review

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Critical Thinking Press is a company who’s products continually draw me towards them.  The material is put together well and focuses upon different skill sets so desperately needed by students, including mine.  And, the books present the material in bite sized pieces making it easy to incorporate into our homeschool days.

One subject area where I am continually looking for more ways to present material to the boys is math.  The older boys have found when sitting for standardized tests that they can see the gaps in knowledge.  Learning the basic facts has been an area they spend a fair amount of time reinforcing.  However, some of the problem solving and incorporation of geometry skills could use some honing.  As I’d like to ‘arm’ them with as much ability as possible before the next round of testing commences, I am happy to add enrichment to our days.

Mathematical Reasoning Book 2 Student Book (4th-8th grade) seemed to be just the ticket to help them out AND allow me to minimize how much time I was spending on it as they could both use the book.  With the Mathematical Reasoning Book 2 Teacher’s Guide (4th-8th grade) in front of me, we began our journey through material they had not readily encountered before.  This program really does need the teacher guide to make heads and tails out of the student book.  Beyond the answers, there are instructions to give the students on what they are expected to do.  Whether it was enjoyment of a break from ‘regular’ math or that the material just clicked, I can’t say for certain. But, I can say that neither boys has complained about doing these extra activities so far.

While D seems to soak it all up with little difficulty, he was even eager to try out a different book.  He got to try Math Reasoning Level C (second grade) this time.  While some of the material inside was ‘easy’ for him, the scope and sequence was different enough from his regular curriculum that it helped fill in those gaps.  The pages are colorful and the material is written so there is no need for a teacher manual.  All the answers are in the back of the book, although I found it basic enough that I didn’t need to avail myself of it.  The copyright allows the purchaser to make copies, so that’s what I did.  Some pages would be fine as black and white printouts, but several of the ones I used with D had me splurging on color ink.

To incorporate a little logic in our days, we have been using Red Herring Mysteries Level 1.  R sits in the prime target range for this book, but I found that both D and P were able to join in on the fun.  Each page has a ‘red herring’ story with a question posed.  The students then ask questions of the teacher that can be answered as yes or no.  The idea is for them to formulate questions that point them towards the answer with the teacher avoiding the issuance of hints.  We found this a fun activity for during lunchtime.  It did take a few passes through to get the hang of the process, though.

You can purchase these and other Critical Thinking Press books from Timberdoodle.  Mathematical Reasoning C (for 2nd grade) retails for $39.99.  Red Herring Mysteries Level 1 retails for $14.99.  Mathematical Reasoning Book 2 retails for $24.99 (student) and $13.99 (teacher.)  Timberdoodle also sells other homeschool supplies or homeschool curriculum you might be interested in acquiring for your home.

Legal Disclosure: As a member of Timberdoodle’s Blogger Review Team I received a free copy of these books in exchange for a frank and unbiased review.