Education City or Maths Whizz?

[follygirl]

Hi,

My dd has just started Y2. She seems to find maths a bit overwhelming at times and panics. I'm also not sure whether she understands the basics. There are a lot of bright sparks in her school so she is currently doing maths which you would normally do in Y3.
I am thinking of subscribing to an online website so that she regains her confidence.

Which is best? Education City or Maths Whizz?

Apparently her reading ability is above her age, she's on level white if that helps.

Thanks

What I meant by adding in her reading ability was that she doesn't need help with reading, it's just maths. Is the maths tuition on Education City as good as on Maths whizz?

A question follygirl - if she finds maths overwhelming, and if you are unsure whether she has grasped the basics, why on earth is she doing work at yr3 level??

Good question lovecheese. She has no choice about doing work at yr3 level.

I'm not saying that she's hopeless at it. She can do mental maths, count in 2s,3s,5s and 10s. All the stuff she should be doing in Yr2. However she sometimes lacks confidence as she panics if she doesn't know the answer immediately. I can see from the curriculum that she will start doing multiplication and dealing with numbers up to 1000 so I just want to make sure that she is completely confident at the basics, which for her is Yr2 maths.

Her teachers aren't worried about it and she doesn't get asked to do extra maths. Her school are hot on this so would give her extra if they thought she needed it.

She has done so well in her reading and is now very confident so I just want to give her the confidence in her maths.

Plus I want to make it fun!

I would get her a tutor. My kids have used both. Education City might be okay if you are self motivated, but didn't seem to do much for them. Maths Whizz does teach, and has helped a lot, but if she gets stressed doing things against the clock you may need to skip certain exercises for her. Or if she is competitive have you looked at MAthletics?

We use both and they are both very good but are completely different.

Ed City offers Maths, Literacy, Science and 3 languages. You need to decide the best level whilst on the trial, so try all different levels and decide whats most appropriate. Its a fantastic package and I would strongly recommend it to everyone. Its a great all round package for the price.

You dont get the whole curriculum but you get a very good cross selection of topics, its easy to use and I would strongly recommend it. There is also the facility to get reports, look at the answers your child gives and it gives you curriculum details.

We only discovered Maths Whizz recently and its very very different.
You cant select the year you want, it is selected after you complete the initial assessment. Depending on your ability these questions will vary, there are several "exam style" questions and a number of games, each with ten questions. The number of games vary from 3 to 6 depending on the level it assesses.

Maths Whizz goes through a full tutorial before each game and then you answer the questions. If you cant answer then a different game with the same topic comes up, sometimes from a lower level.

There is very little reporting from Maths Whizz and you get no feedback about the answers given to any questions. If you dont hover over your child, you cant see how they are coping (other than a percentage result).

Education City also explains briefly the concepts in most categories.

Education City - you control the year levels and what games you play.

Maths Whizz - you have no control over the tutorials, but there is a topic section so you can replay the lessons, and it also offers the lessons from lower levels than you "maths age".
.

Sorry, to answer your question about which is best for maths, I can say that for more than a year I have been more than happy with the maths on Education City and my child has learnt a huge amount, as well as concepts and strategies.

Whizz Maths is very different, and only focusses on maths.

My child is older so this now suits us because it goes beyond the Education City levels so I dont know how effective it is for the very early years.

Trial them both and see what suits your DD. What we like doesnt always mean our kids will!

Have tried both and prefer Maths Whizz - because it builds on previous knowledge and the level of difficulty builds with the child's learning - you get instantly updated progress reports showing you how your child is doing across the topics and they have a helpline - with genuinely helpful, knowledgeable people on it. My issue with Education City is that the levels are too broad - so in choosing Y2 level my dc found it much too hard in Sept and then it got much too easy, but he was still completely floored when he moved to Yr3 because he just couldn't do it - which didn't do much for his confidence.

Thank you so much for all taking the time to reply.
I think I will trial Maths Whizz for a month and see how we go. I don't really want her to spend hours on the computer and as it is only maths she needs help with, I think this might suit us.

How are you getting on with Maths Whizz. We joined a couple of weeks ago. I wanted to make sure my DD (y2) has the basis really well to knowing she has missed 6 months of year 1. She's pretty tired now towards the end of the term so I think we'll back off this week and let her enjoy her final week in school and pick up again over Xmas holidays.

I have found it to be useful. I try to look at the topics ahead of time then I know if she's going to need help or not. If they look tough then I sit with her. It's been good to see what strategies they are using.

Hope it's helping your little one.

Poppet

Hi PoppetUK.
She is doing really well with Maths Whizz. Her confidence has grown leaps and bounds. Her teacher even commented on it during parent's evening. I think it makes maths more 'fun' and she really enjoys doing it. She has even had stickers at school because she's been doing so well at maths.
We haven't done it for a while as she's tired and we've been busy but we'll do it during the holidays.

Overall we're really pleased with it.

Hello,
I work as a TA in year 2, i have found Maths Whizz to be fantastic for the children to improve their math skills, you can start off with the easiest and ease your way through the programs, lots of fun to do with your child!

How much does Maths Whizz cost per month?

We just joined before the price increase. It's now £19.99 or £150 for the year I think.

Thanks for the feedback Missozzy. It's good to know someone in the classroom can see a difference. I've been reluctant to tell the school because I wanted to see what it was like first.

I love the fact that I can preview the lessons, I can then tell if DD is likely to need help. If she does then I make sure I am going to be available. Nothing worse than having her asking for some help and the other little ones needing something and of course I might be cooking tea at the same time!!!!!!

I also feel that I am spreading myself thinly because my DS (19 months) is into everything. This phase is hard because my older two are pretty settled these days until little monkey comes along and starts throwing everything. Roll on 6 months and we will hopefully be past some of the annoying things.

The preview of the lessons is a new feature and I too think this is good. Ive had lots of practice myself.

Just had feedback from teachers and my DC are also doing extremely well at school. I think its great.

The holiday specials have just started, they can play different games (after doing lessons of course to get points) but its something different that appears every holiday.

I also like the fact that lessons appear on subjects they are not as confident with, and they have to do them to move on, whereas with most websites if they dont want to do a lesson on a particular subject they find something else to do.

I do tend to sit and watch rather than letting DC work by themselves so that I can see if they have found it easy, or struggled a bit.

The use of "number of helps" is also a good tool, this gives parents an indication of how they coped with a topic.

Another Maths Whizz fan here! I did a video review of it on my website. I also reviewed Education City, which although great value for the number of subjects it covers, doesn't have a lot of depth in the maths work it presents.

The Maths Age in Maths-Whizz means that weaker topics are repeated and parents can see how their child is doing in each topic area. The graphics and kid incentives are good but not so good to be distracting (it's not like a playstation game!)

There's a special link on my video review for a free maths age test and 5 free lessons if anyone wants to test it out.

My 10 yo daughter likes ConquerMaths, clear explanations and keeps track of progress.

Another MathsWizz fan here, but have no knowledge of others to comspare.

Is there any reason you have upped every old mathswhizz thread jake?

And that all the old mathswizz threads have the same people raving about it.

Did you decide it was time for a little more free internet marketing?

dont know why my post was deleted , but all i can say is it works for me and my son.

probably because you upped every old mathswhizz thread (this one had been dead 2 years) coupled with the fact you had never posted on any other subject so it looked very much like advertising rather than just a recommendation ...

And you used the exact same post on 5 threads.

Sorry this thread wasn't that old it was one of the others you upped.