Feature photo (above) by Jimmie via flickr. Photo (right) by Old Shoe Woman via Flickr.
Nearing the end of Miquon Blue today, my youngest daughter encountered fractions greater than one. She collapsed on the floor of my bedroom in tears.
The worksheet started innocently enough:
[Rescued from my old blog.]
I love Miquon math, but the program does feel odd to many homeschoolers, especially at first. It is so different from the math most of us grew up with that it takes time for the teacher to adjust. DJ asked for Miquon advice at a forum I frequent, but I thought enough people might find these tips useful to justify an expanded repost. If you have more advice on teaching Miquon, please chime in!
[Rescued from my old blog. To read the entire series, click here: Elementary Problem Solving Series. Photo by Studio 757 via Flickr (CC BY 2.0).]
You can begin to teach your children algebraic thinking in preschool, if you treat algebra as a problem-solving game. Young children are masters at solving problems, at figuring things out. They constantly explore their world, piecing together the mystery of how things work. For preschool children, mathematical concepts are just part of life’s daily adventure. Their minds grapple with understanding the three-ness of three blocks or three fingers or one raisin plus two more raisins make three.
Wise homeschooling parents put those creative minds to work. They build a foundation for algebra with games that require the same problem-solving skills children need for abstract math: the ability to visualize a situation and to apply common sense.
Continue reading Elementary Problem Solving: The Early Years
The Carnival of Mathematics: Inaugural Edition is up and running at Abstract Nonsense blog.
Alon writes:
I’ve gotten plenty of submissions that span the entire gamut of math-blogging: education, pure math, applied math, debunking bad math – it’s all there. Only the gender distribution could be made slightly more equal (and that’s an understatement). I’m linking to the posters in roughly increasing order of mathematical difficulty, but don’t let my opinions deter you from reading the posts closer to the bottom.
Indeed, there are many great posts to read. Enjoy!
Well, I didn’t get any takers with the last story problem challenge. But school is in full session now, and we’re doing story problems in Math Club this Friday, so I thought I’d try again.
Here’s the challenge: Can you and your students make up some original math problems?
In Math Club, we always start by reading part of the book Math by Kids for inspiration. I can’t print those stories here, however, because of copyright rules, so I’ll share some of the stories my past students have made, arranged in roughly increasing order of difficulty. After you solve a couple of these problems with your children, encourage them to try making some of their own.
And please, share their gems with us!
The problems below are now available as a printable handout: Story Problem Challenge.
It’s been ages since I shared the blackboard quotes from my co-op math classes. Here are some of our recent ones for your reading pleasure…
[Rescued from my old blog.]
Once again, Rudbeckia Hirta brings us some funny-but-sad mathematics. The test question was:
Without factoring it, explain how the number
N = (1 x 2 x 3 x 4 x 5 x 6 x 7 x 8 x 9 x 10 x 11) + 1
can be used to argue that there is a prime number larger than 11.
I want to tell you a story. Everyone likes a story, right? But at the heart of my story lies a confession that I am afraid will shock many readers. People assume that because I teach math, blog about math, give advice about math on internet forums, and present workshops about teaching math — because I do all this, I must be good at math.
Apply logic to that statement. The conclusion simply isn’t valid. …
Update: This post has moved.
I found two helpful articles at squareCircleZ.
Ten Ways to Survive the Math Blues
General tips on how to learn as much as possible from any math course.The need for further exploration
What to do after you find the answer to a math problem.
[Rescued from my old blog.]
Percents are one of the math monsters, the toughest topics of elementary and junior high school arithmetic. The most important step in solving any percent problem is to figure out what quantity is being treated as the basis, the whole thing that is 100%. The whole is whatever quantity to which the other things in the problem are being compared.
![\frac{1}{2} \times 8=\left[ \quad \right]](https://s0.wp.com/latex.php?latex=%5Cfrac%7B1%7D%7B2%7D+%5Ctimes+8%3D%5Cleft%5B+%5Cquad+%5Cright%5D&bg=ffffff&fg=303030&s=2&c=20201002)
Denise Gaskins' Let's Play Math 