working in 3/8 or 6/8 etc..
is grade three work. ie the timing covered in the third year of anyone learning to play the sax.

my pro used words to keep in time

ex if you play a group of three 1/8 notes, say the word
cov-ven-tre very fast instead of counting 1-2-3
and swing it while playing.

ex if you play a group of two notes (1/4 note followed by a 1/8 note), say the word
Deer-be very fast instead of counting 1,2-3 and swing it while playing.
words can swing timing better than counting

it is quite common in music sheets for the notes totalled up in the first bar to be less. If you then follow through the music sheet, quite often the last bar contains the missing note or notes. For some reason the missing rests at the start of a bar are left out and you have to count them in.

ex in 4/4 timing the first bar may only have a 1/4 note.. count 1,2,3 and play the 1/4 note.

in 12/8 timing ie 12 beats to the bar,

lst bar dotted half rest = 5 beats followed by dotted quarter rest = 3 beats – this totals 8 beats, so you only have 4 beats left over.

remember the metronome only clicks 4 times in a bar.

so the first three clicks play nothing and on the last click play the dotted triplet