Sunday, May 29, 2011

Sing n' learn reviews: Classical Math & The Presidents March


Classical Math to Classical Music by Sing n' learn
I've known that Miss E (and my younger kids too) needed some work on her division tables, so I was excited when Sing n' learn offered me the chance to review one of their Classical Math CD and workbook sets! We were sent their Division version which covers Division Tables 2-12. While I did let her listen to it a couple of times on her own, the first time we all listened to it was in the car. By the second song the kids were all singing along quite joyfully!

Since the music is classical music it is easy to listen to, and I was pleasantly surprised at how well the vocals went along with the music. I love that they go through each set twice (with the answers) and then a third time without the answers. We only prompted the kids once (on the first song) "do you know the answers?" after that they sang along with each song, even my six year old was getting into these! These have great potential for helping kids learn their Math tables!

I like that this CD comes with a workbook that has information about each of the Classical Musicians and a crossword puzzle for each of them (with the answers in the back of the book). That way your kids are not just learning the math, but are able to recognize the name of the song, musician, and information about the musician! I liked this set, and I'm considering purchasing the one for Multiplication.

The U.S. President's March by Sing n' learn
This CD not only includes a song for the Presidents in order, but also the First Ladies! There is also a bonus song about the constitution (a bit of history of how it came to be). Again, the music was great, and the vocals were well done on The President's March songs. We listened to these in the car too, but noticed that no one was able to sing along. They just could not catch the words/names (but we were enjoying listening!).The CD has three tracks for each song, one is just the song, the other is a split track, and then the third is with no vocals. These will help in learning the names, and then practicing on your own.

We realized that this CD had a couple of uses, one was to just listen to it and hear the names (without the goal of memorizing, but being familiar). The other would be if you are actually focusing on learning all of the presidents and are wanting a song to sing the names by (but would have already become familiar with all of the names). I don't think this is a CD that you can just pop in and think that your kids are going to get these names stuck in their heads, it is going to take more effort than that, but it will be a great accompaniment to your plan for learning the President's/First Ladies' names.

*Sing n' learn sent me free copies of these CDs so that I could review them. I was not otherwise compensated for this review and these are my honest opinions (and that of my husband and children as well!).

1 comment:

  1. The words and names of all the Presidents and First Ladies are in the booklet included in the CD case. There is also information on each President included in the booklet as well. You will be surprised at how quickly the children will learn the song after playing it several times.

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