An update on our homeschool math

A quick note about a resource you may like:

The Everyday Homeschooler’s Guide to Teaching the Early Years is for all parents of young students who are beginning to homeschool or who are in their early elementary years. Homeschooling young children doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive, and this no-fuss resource will show you how. It will guide you on how to create an ideal environment that will honor your child’s natural desire to learn as well as how to foster creativity and tips on setting priorities.

This resource also answers many questions that new homeschoolers have, such as What are my kids supposed to learn? What resources should I use? How do I meet other homeschoolers? And much more.

Thanks so much to my readers for inspiring me to write this. I hope it helps.

Click here to view the Table of Contents and Introduction.

Click here to purchase.

Now back to the original post….

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Read these posts to see how we’ve made it this far in math:

I’m a firm believer that you need to find whatever works for you and your child. Don’t be scared to try different things until you find what works!

Last year we completed through Chapter 13 (out of 19) in Life of Fred: Cats, which is the third book in that series. My son loves Life of Fred. It is story-based, quirky, and you can access the link to my review of it above. Using it as a guide, I found other ways to practice the math concepts he was learning in that book. But by Chapter 13, it just got too hard for him, so I stopped.*

Part of the reason the book got hard was not because of the math. Because Life of Fred is a story, the author brings in anecdotes about other things, which is interesting and educational, but for my six-year-old last year, it went over his head.

I didn’t think he was ready to continue it this year either, so I have been reviewing math concepts with him. To begin with, we didn’t use anything too exciting. I had some workbooks, so I used those:

Grade K Telling Time by Creative Teaching Press – At first I thought it would be good practice, but this is way too easy for my son, so I’m going to save it for the four-year-old.
Grade 1 Money Mania by Creative Teaching Press – This has proven to be a very good practice workbook. (Click here for more information about how I teach about money.)
A+ Addition Workbook – He finished this recently, although I didn’t make him do a few of the pages.

I don’t like making my son do a lot of worksheets or workbooks, but in math, it has been necessary in order to hone in on important concepts and help him not forget what he has learned.

All of the concepts he has learned up until now, he’s very good at. He’s especially good at counting coins and telling time! He does well with place value too. He can add and subtract well but he doesn’t have his addition and subtraction facts memorized. I’m not going to worry about that yet. I’ve noticed that something has “clicked” for him this past year in math (and reading). I think for some children, age seven must be when things come together.

Note: We do math lessons twice a week. Doing more than that has not given me better results, and I think doing more formal lessons would make him hate math. Right now he doesn’t mind it because of the slow approach I’ve taken as well as finding fun ways to learn it. As he gets older, we’ll continue to reassess what his needs will be.

I am planning to continue in Life of Fred again, but I may wait a little while. (*UPDATE: Spring 2014 – We did eventually go back to Life of Fred: Cats. I decided to start at the beginning of the book again, and then we finished the whole thing. So just waiting awhile really helped my son.) I have found an app for our iPad that my son and I both like very much, and he’s getting a lot of good practice with it. I like it because it keeps track of what my son is doing, how he is doing, and it automatically goes to the higher level when he has completed a lower level.

The app is Splash Math for Grade 1. It costs $9.99, which is much more than I usually pay for an app, but it has been well worth it.

Splash Math is a lot like doing a workbook, but it’s on the iPad. My son likes it much more than doing a workbook, and that’s okay with me. Unlike other apps, I consider this one our “math lesson,” so I sit with him as he works through the problems. Sometimes he needs help reading the word problems. I have also taught him “greater than” “less than” by using this app.

I also like that I can turn concepts on and off. If they are off, they won’t be included in my son’s practice. For example, I can turn off questions about “data and graphs” until I’m ready to teach it to my son. I have found that by sitting with him while he works through the questions, if he comes to something he doesn’t understand, I can explain it to him or do one problem for him, and from then on, he gets it.

My son likes it because he gets rewarded with an “aquarium,” and he gets something new for the aquarium periodically, such as a fish or crab, as he earns more points. The graphics don’t thrill me, and I don’t care for the anvil that you can drop on a crab’s head, but he likes the app, he’s practicing math, and that’s all that matters.

Sum Swamp game is great for practicing early math skills. The little container of vehicles does not come with it, but that’s how my four-year-old plays with it.

My boys’ favorite way to learn math is by playing Sum Swamp. I can’t recommend this game enough. We play it a lot (not just for math lessons). I bought it so that the seven-year-old could practice addition and subtraction, but it has been a great way to introduce the four-year-old to math, and he loves this game. He asks me to play it with him, and he will even play it by himself! (He uses manipulatives to add and subtract. The seven-year-old doesn’t need them.) It’s even fun for me!

Sum Swamp teaches addition, subtraction, the operation symbols + and -, even/odd numbers, and how to be a gracious winner and not a sore loser! Although we’re still working on those last two!

In my next post, I’ll be addressing how I’ve taught my son about money – both how to count it and financial responsibility. (Click here for that.)

That is it for first grade math. Please tell me what resources you have enjoyed using!

Last year I wrote a comprehensive post on how I have been doing kindergarten math. I teach my six-year-old math in a variety of ways, but our main resource is Life of Fred. At that time, we had finished the first book in the Life of Fred series (Apples), but when I started the second book (Butterflies), I realized it was too hard for the then five-year-old.

Pros

First, in case you’re unfamiliar with Life of Fred, it’s a comprehensive math curriculum for K-12, but you can buy the books separately, which is nice. It’s written like a story with a character named Fred who is a five-year-old math professor at Kittens University. If that sounds silly, you’re right. The story is light and fun, and it’s full of math. Each chapter ends with a few math problems for your child to solve. I like that it’s comprehensive, but it’s not overwhelming or a lot of busy work. We can finish a chapter and do the problems in about 30 minutes. My son loves the story too. For a child who seems to learn well through story, it’s really great.

{You can learn more about Life of Fred and download sample chapters here: When Do I Start Life of Fred Math.}

In September when we started our new homeschool routine, I started Butterflies with him. I was happy to find that my instincts had been right – last year it was too hard for him, but now it seemed just right. I am also more relaxed and using it as a guide for me.

I don’t worry if he doesn’t get something. I just tell him the answer and think of other ways to show him. As long as he’s not showing frustration or disinterest, I feel the best way is to go over the material many times in an easy-going manner.

Some of the math did not come easy to my son, so I tried to find other ways to teach him. For example, counting by twos and fives is a big part of Butterflies.

At first, I was at a loss as to how to teach my son how to count by twos and fives. I had gone over it several times. I used YouTube videos. I used charts. I took him outside and drew numbers with chalk, and then we did “skip counting” in a literal way! I wondered if he just wasn’t ready or if there was another approach I needed to take? As I said before, since my son did not balk at the lessons, I decided that just taking it easy and going over it again and again would be my approach.

Then one day he just got it! I have no idea what did it ~ Maybe it was that episode, LeapFrog Numberland, on Netflix? Maybe it was Life of Fred. Maybe it was all my attempts….in reality it was probably all of it together. Perhaps my son paid more attention to that song in LeapFrog Numberland because of all my attempts to teach him. Who knows? I didn’t really care. I was just elated he got it!

Now that we’re on the last chapter of Life of Fred: Butterflies, I’m happy to realize that it fit nicely into this Fall season too. (As I mentioned before, I alternate short reading and math lessons Monday-Thursday. I do one chapter at a time of Life of Fred.) I’m planning to order the next book and start it in January.

Cons

However, I want to mention some of the frustrations I’ve had too, and I still haven’t made up my mind as to whether Life of Fred will be our only math curriculum.

In Life of Fred: Apples, the author focuses on teaching all the possible equations that add up to the sum of 7. In Butterflies, he concentrates on adding to the sum of 9. While doing Apples with my son, he started to realize that the answer to the equations was “7.” He didn’t memorize that 5 + 2 = 7. In Butterflies, the answers to the equations in the book is either “9” or “7.” While this is good because my son can’t take for granted what the answer is, I can tell he’s not memorizing the equations. He usually has to count on his fingers.

And this brings me to my question of whether it’s important for him to memorize those equations? I wrote here that I wouldn’t mind if he counted on his fingers, and I still don’t mind. I’m glad he can figure out the answer for himself. But it also makes me wonder what else I need to do, or does it matter at this point?

I spoke to a friend of mine who is a retired Kindergarten teacher, and she told me that they never pressed the kids to memorize anything. Having fun and getting the answer is more important. This is how I feel, but you know, I always have those moments of second guessing.

I also have mixed emotions that parts of Life of Fred is hard. That is, the author will bring in non-math information or a higher level math. On one hand, I think it’s great. It’s teaching my son a variety of things, and there’s nothing wrong with introducing him to harder stuff, especially when I don’t worry about whether he really gets it. But there are times when I feel it’s going over his head and he’s not getting anything out of it. I worry he might become disinterested in the story.

This is mostly balanced by the fact that my son says he likes Life of Fred. The other day he said, “The only way I should learn math is with Life of Fred.”

So maybe none of that is a con. It’s more of an observation and consideration for the future. For now, we’re going to stick with Life of Fred, and I’ll supplement it with some other fun activities, math story books, videos and educational apps….like I’ve always done.

Some extra math resources

As I mentioned above, Life of Fred: Butterflies spends a lot of time on teaching counting by 2s, 5s, and also telling time. Here’s a few YouTube videos that I’ve used to help my son grasp these concepts. I especially like the video on telling time.