[An addendum to my earlier Charlotte Mason Math series.]
“Our business is to give [children] mind-stuff, and both quality and quantity are essential. Naturally, each of us possesses this mind-stuff only in limited measure, but we know where to procure it; for the best thought the world possesses is stored in books; we must open books to children, the best books; our own concern is abundant provision and orderly serving.”
— Charlotte Mason, Toward A Philosophy of Education
Most homeschool teachers, whatever our curriculum or schooling approach, understand the importance of teaching with living books. We read aloud biographies, historical fiction, or the classics of literature. We scour library shelves for the most creative presentations of scientific topics that interest our children, and encourage our high school students to go back to the original documents whenever possible.
And we teach math with a textbook.
Not that textbooks are inherently bad, because math is an abstract science. We need to meet the ideas — the “mind-stuff” — of math on their own terms, and textbooks can help with that.
But it’s not enough.
Denise Gaskins' Let's Play Math 