Laraba's Homeschool Blog

Oct. 8, 2009 - Math Musings

Last week, I purchased a CD-ROM with a series of math drills called Calculadder. This is a big deal for me and to explain why, I’ll have refer back to my own years in school.

I will be 40 this month, so I have to think back 33 years to the time when I sat in a 2^nd grade public school classroom in a small town in the Thumb of Michigan. Like most of my contemporaries, I spent considerable time doing math worksheets. I’m sure you remember these; I had to solve 50 to 60 simple addition or subtraction problems in a short amount of time. I remember rather enjoying it and was good at it.

Math continued to be somewhat interesting through 6^th grade. I attended a missionary school in the jungles of Bolivia from 4^th through 6^th grade, and it was quite a bit like homeschooling. The classes were very small (4 to 5 students) and my parents were 2 of my teachers! I remember my mother sitting down one day and showing me simple algebra, and I thought it interesting.

We came back to Michigan when I was going into the 7^th grade, and I felt like I had fallen into a Math Black Hole. I don’t remember learning one new thing in math for 7^th and 8^th grade. I was bored and frustrated. Every day, we were assigned 25 to 30 problems for homework. I’m a first born compulsive type so I did them, but it exasperated me. The school was small, rural, and inflexible and while my parents wanted me to take Algebra in 8^th grade, the Powers That Be refused. Math got interesting again in 9^th grade, and I was permitted to double up Algebra 2 and Trigonometry in 11^th so I could take Calculus 1 at a local community college for my senior year. My college majors were in engineering so I had lots of math, most of it challenging. At some point, I passed where I could really UNDERSTAND what I was doing; I felt that most in a graduate level calculus class where we were integrating over three dimensional objects. The course was taught by an intelligent gentleman with poor English skills, and I only passed that class (indeed, I got an “A”) because I was good at following equations. But I didn’t really grasp the concepts well, and that frustrated me.

My 7^th and 8^th grade and my graduate level calculus experience considerably affected my teaching style in math. I have a strong desire to make math interesting for our children; I’ve also felt it far more important that they understand the concepts behind something then that they memorize a bunch of facts or formulas or methods.

In this I was reinforced by Ruth Beechick’s small book (part of the Three R’s series) about teaching math. She believes that schools often err by focusing too much on rote memorization, and not enough on conceptual understanding.

The result of my experience and reading led me to focus on teaching concepts and disdain drills. I read articles and talked to friends who believed that children needed to memorize basic math facts so that they could work problems quickly, but I didn’t agree with them. Oh, I did buy a couple of math drill games like Quarter Mile Math and Timez Attack, but I didn’t consistently have the children use them.

My belief was that if we practiced enough interesting problems, the children would just “pick up” the basic math facts. I felt that math worksheets were boring and I didn’t want the kids bored, so we would just progress onto more interesting problems and pick up the math facts along the way.

This method worked fairly well with our eldest child, who did pick up math facts easily. I am guessing Timez Attack helped her with her multiplication tables considerably and she played it because she enjoyed it. She did NOT like Quarter Mile Math and I didn’t press it, but she knows her basic facts.

Our 3^rd child and 1^st son also remembers facts easily. (He also has a passion for Timez Attack, with the result that at age 6 he has largely memorized the times tables through 12 X 12.)

And then there is our 2^nd child. Lydia has math aptitude and grasps math concepts easily, but she hasn’t memorized her basic addition, subtraction, and multiplication facts. And surprise, surprise, it is slowing her WAY down. A few weeks ago, I realized that those friends and articles that emphasize some rote memorization are right where she is concerned. She needs to memorize her basic addition, subtraction, and multiplication facts, and the sooner the better. So I purchased a CD-ROM with Calculadder worksheets, and we’re doing timed tests every day as she works on quickly solving simple addition problems. Of course, we’ll move onto subtraction and multiplication after she has those addition facts down.

This whole issue reminded me again that I need to hold my homeschooling opinions somewhat lightly. I tend to be opinionated about how to teach certain areas. Sometimes I’m wrong. Sometimes what works well with our first child doesn’t work well with my second. I pray that God will grant me the wisdom to see when I’m wrong about something, and the wisdom to change course when it is necessary.

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Comments

Oct. 11, 2009 - Math Woes

Hi Laraba,
That is so funny! We went through the whole 'no rote drill' thing too, and it hampered my oldest. My next has quite an aptitude for math, so nothing hampered him. Then we did Calculadder for a summer, and I felt guilty the whole time--it was so 'bad' to do rote math drill, you know. Now we've found Quarter Mile Math and I make the children do some everyday, and I'm glad.

We compulsive first-born moms need to learn a bit of moderation, I think, and it's good to know I'm not the only one. :)

Annie Kate

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Oct. 11, 2009 - Untitled Comment

By the way, I'm tickled pink to know that 3D integration is considered a grad course, because I had an awful time with it as a physics undergrad. :)

You made me feel better about that. Thank you.

Annie Kate

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Oct. 13, 2009 - Math

Math was a nightmare for me growing up. However, I understand it very well now, but still am having such a hard time teaching it!!!! It consumes WAY too much of our day EVERY day!

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