One of the best ways we can help our children learn mathematics (or anything else) is to always be learning ourselves.
Here are a few stories to read with your Friday morning coffee:
- Don’t miss Playful Math Carnival 131. So much mathy goodness!
- Do you have early learners? Christina Tondevold explains the building blocks of Number Sense for Pre-K to 2nd grade children.
- Joe Schwartz ponders the importance of asking “too many” questions, both for the 1960s space race and for children learning math.
- Do you like your math spiced with humor? Ben Orlin tackles the perennial question, Why Isn’t 1 a Prime Number?
- If it’s time to teach your kids about the order of operations, consider using David Butler’s graphic version The Operation Tower. But don’t let yourself be drawn into those “gotcha!” memes on social media. As Dave Peterson points out (using trig functions), Order of Operations flows from basic common sense. If you need parentheses to make your meaning clear, then use them.
“What do we need to know in order to accomplish the goal? Well, start asking questions. And remember, one unasked question could put the entire enterprise in jeopardy…”
—Joe Schwartz
Houston, 1964
“It’s a little weird, isn’t it, that prime means first, and yet the first number isn’t prime?”
—Ben Orlin
Why Isn’t 1 a Prime Number?
CREDITS: Feature photo (top) by Kira auf der Heide via Unsplash. “Morning Coffee” post format inspired by Nate Hoffelder at The Digital Reader.
Denise Gaskins' Let's Play Math 