What Do You Use for Curriculum to Teach Them Math?

Teaching children calls for a variety of things.  The LEAST important of those things is a good tool.  It's possible to teach with lousy tools.   At the stage I'm at, I am convinced that I could teach things like reading, writing, and math with a stick and a dirt floor.  Give me a lot of smooth river rocks, a sharpie marker or two and a stack of 3x5 cards and I would call it "Slick!"

A good tool is just really, really nice.


Arithmetic  

noun |əˈriθməˌtik|

the branch of mathematics dealing with the properties and manipulation of numbers 

New Oxford American Dictionary 2nd edition © 2005 by Oxford University Press, Inc.

Learning about numbers is a thing that you introduce in just everyday activities. You can count to your children.  Toes, cars, windows, and grapes are all good.  I've counted scabs, bandaids, holes in jeans, and duct tape patches, too.  They all work.  It all counts (silly puns run in my family) toward immersion in the concepts of math skills.

After the basics of planned conversation, I have a favorite tool. 

Be careful where you leave Mom's Math-It Timer Plate.  It will cost you $12 to replace it! YIKES!

Math-It, by Elmer W. Brooks, has been my foundational math tool.  I use the solitaire-style games and the guidebook to teach everything through long division with decimals and rounding.

Editor's note:  Mr. Brooks doesn't have a site where he sells his stuff.  You should be able to find these materials by searching for them by name and author.

Our children make their own practice sheets by using these 3x5 recipe cards, ...

... some ten-sided dice (see below),

... their own paper and pencil,

... and some simple directions for use.  I've already taught them how to do the math with the Math-It program's ideas. 

When my students are finished with me & Math-It, they are usually seven or eight years old and enter....



Go ahead.   Guess.

With just these simple materials, what is their arithmetic mastery?

These are the 10 sided dice we use with the cards above.  You get them at your local Gaming or Role Playing Gaming store.  Because you like to shop locally.  It's better for your community.  But you are supposed to be guessing what my kids enter after using these tools.

When my students are finished with me & Math-It, they enter Fifth Grade math materials.

Independently.

Yup.  I am their one-on-one tutor as needed but I don't need to provide instruction for them.

But Sarah, you are just a natural at math skills!  I can't do that!  Oh, for Petey's sake!  Before I used this with my first student, I added on my fingers - I kid you NOT!  I could not multiply in my head without first counting on my fingers.  I learned my arithmetic skills along with my children and can pass them on now!  I was driven to learn and turned that into an ability.