Coming Soon! In March, I’ll be launching my newest book, Charlotte Mason’s Living Math: Applying the Principles of Education to Help Children Develop Mathematical Reasoning.
And the Kickstarter prelaunch page is now live. That means you can sign up to get an email from Kickstarter as soon as the campaign launches:
(If you back the campaign on launch day, that encourages the Kickstarter folks to share it with more people.)
This game is fun for all ages, but especially good for elementary children just beginning to think about probability.
Many parents remember struggling to learn math. We hope to provide a better experience for our children.
And one of the best ways for children to enjoy learning is through hands-on play.
Math Concepts: addition, probability.
Players: solitaire.
Equipment: two six-sided dice, pencil and paper.
Writing to Learn Math: People learn math by playing with ideas. A math journal can be like a science lab book.
Do you want your children to develop the ability to reason creatively and figure out things on their own?
Help kids practice slowing down and taking the time to fully comprehend a math topic or problem-solving situation with these classic tools of learning: Notice. Wonder. Create.
The farther we go in math, the more division disappears. It ceases to exist as a separate concept.
Instead, we learn to see division as:
Each of these perspectives offers us a new way to think about and make sense of our calculations.
This game challenges upper-elementary and middle school students to reason about number properties.
Many parents remember struggling to learn math. We hope to provide a better experience for our children.
And one of the best ways for children to enjoy learning is through hands-on play.
Math Concepts: Venn diagrams, factors and multiples, divisibility, prime numbers, and other number properties.
Players: two or more.
Equipment: pencil and paper, or whiteboard and markers. Calculator optional.
Writing to Learn Math: Problem-solving cares less about whether an answer is right and more about whether a solution makes sense.
Do you want your children to develop the ability to reason creatively and figure out things on their own?
Help kids practice slowing down and taking the time to fully comprehend a math topic or problem-solving situation with these classic tools of learning: Notice. Wonder. Create.
The methods in last week’s Advanced Multiplication post only work for certain numbers, but we have another, more powerful multiplication tool: We can always use a ratio table to make sense of any multiplication.
Ratios are the beginning of proportional thinking. We can systematically alter the numbers in a ratio to reach any quantity required by our problem.
Students begin working with ratios in story problems that help them visualize and make sense of a proportional relationship.
Continue reading Mental Math: Advanced Multiplication, Part 2
This equation game for elementary students builds creative, flexible thinking about addition and subtraction.
Many parents remember struggling to learn math. We hope to provide a better experience for our children.
And one of the best ways for children to enjoy learning is through hands-on play.
Math Concepts: addition, subtraction, multistep calculation.
Players: any number.
Equipment: one deck of math cards, pencils and paper, timer (optional).
Writing to Learn Math: What did the author mean? Put the thought in your own words. Do you agree or disagree? Why?
Do you want your children to develop the ability to reason creatively and figure out things on their own?
Help kids practice slowing down and taking the time to fully comprehend a math topic or problem-solving situation with these classic tools of learning: Notice. Wonder. Create.
Mental math is the key to algebra because the same principles underlie them both.
As our children learn to do calculations in their heads, they make sense of how numbers work together and build a strong foundation of understanding.
Remember that while mental math is always done WITH the mind, reasoning our way to the answer, it doesn’t have to be only IN the mind. Make sure your students have scratch paper or a whiteboard handy to jot down intermediate steps as needed.
Besides, math is always more fun when kids get to use colorful markers on a whiteboard.
Continue reading Mental Math: Advanced Multiplication, Part 1
Denise Gaskins' Let's Play Math 