Bottom Line: Beyond Cats! Grade 2 Math Standards — Practice Common Core Math for 2nd Graders is a math app that offers your child a fun way to practice the math skills required for 2nd grade. Multiple accounts can be set up to track all of the kids in your family or classroom. All of the skills are designed to adhere to Common Core standards.
If you would like to purchase Beyond Cats! Grade 2 Math Standards — Practice Common Core Math for 2nd Graders (iPad/iPhone, $2.99), please use the handy link provided so they’ll know how you found them:
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Several months ago I reviewed Beyond Cats! Grade 1 Math Standards — Practice Common Core Math for 1st Graders by Maypop Designs and gave it a good, solid four-star rating. So I was pleased when Beyond Cats! Grade 2 Math Standards popped up on my review schedule. I was eager to see if they could carry the same quality and variety into the next grade level. Fortunately there was no need for concern. I found all of the same strengths in this grade level as in the previous one (and also some of the same weaknesses.)
Beyond Cats! Grade 2 Math Standards follows the same format as its predecessor, with each skill being presented as a set of nine questions and the answers being shown on a grid. As each answer is used, it disappears until the final question has only one answer as a choice. If you’ve answered correctly all along, then the final answer should be the correct one. Once all of the questions are answered, the user is presented with a picture puzzle. If all of the answers were correct, the puzzle will be complete. But if any of the answers were wrong, the user has the opportunity to go back and correct them. As each new set of problems is presented, the user is given a visual example of what is being asked. At the completion of each puzzle, the user earns points that can be redeemed later for pictures of butterflies and insects from around the world.
Of course, the skills that we are practicing this time around are more difficult in nature, but they are also skills that my 2nd grader can start putting into practice in everyday life. Skills like recognition, sequencing, and relativity are expanded on from the previous grade level, along with more difficult addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. There are even the dreaded fractions. Only there is no reason to dread them here.
Your kiddo will get in some geometry practice with patterns and positioning. There is also some symmetry practice thrown in with a little bit of shape ID (and they sneak those fractions in again).
I found the measurements section to have a lot more real-world skills tested this time with more complex money and time questions.
Just like with Grade 1, there is just a massive amount of content here to keep your little learner learning.
Multiple accounts can be set up so that parents or teachers can track multiple children. The skills appear to progress in difficulty as you go along. Parents/teachers can choose to start all of the skills over from the beginning if needed, or to skip ahead for kids that need more challenge.
What I liked:
- There is a LOT of content. And a LOT of variety.
- It is all presented in such a way that things don’t get stale. Because the difficulty increases based on each user's progression, kids don’t have a chance to get bored.
What I might change (and I’m afraid these are pretty much the same weaknesses I found in the previous grade):
- I feel like the challenge would be greater and the learning potential would be increased if answers did not disappear as used. I feel like when there are fewer answers to choose from, a child might just have a tendency to guess rather than making a choice based on real deduction. And when it gets down to just one, well, then they really don’t look at the problem at all.
- I still say that the availability of verbal instructions would be a welcome reinforcement for kids who are less visual learners.
In the Grade 1 app, I also picked on the fact that I didn’t think the picture rewards grabbed my kids’ interest enough, but I’ve got to tell you that in Grade 2 my son found the bugs much more motivating. So, score!
I’m giving Beyond Cats! Grade 2 Math Standards — Practice Common Core Math for 2nd Graders another solid four-star rating. I do still see that bit of room for improvement that would take these apps to the next level. But as a whole this app is a comprehensive tool to help your children practice their math skills with minimal arm twisting and teeth gnashing.
*****
Kelli cannot believe that September is now over. SmartAppsForKids.com was paid a priority review fee to complete this review in an expedited manner.
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