Maths

Puddle Maths 2

WorkBooks

Over the last year we have been working on Maths in a variety of ways. Fran quite likes workbooks in moderation so we have used them intermittently. Her favourite has been the Early Bird Singapore set which are a realy nice collection of books. They don’t dwell too long on any subject but they are well thought out and it is easy to boost the topics with other work. She has also used Schofield & Sims books and likes them but she has been a very reluctant writer, so I tend to fill in answers for her to avoid it becoming a chore. it would be fair to say we use them rarely though, there are better ways to spend our days! However recently we have started to use Miquon Maths in a gentle fashion which she really seems to enjoy now.

Puzzle Sums

Most recently a spark has been lit by a game by DK called Puzzle Sums – it is a set of jigsaws made up of an adding or subtracting sum on one side and = whatever on the other – only the right answers fit as a control of error. Fran learnt to use these (properly, not by just fitting the jigsaws) in 30 minutes and is now competently doing addition and subtraction using numbers 0-10. We have used our maths rods and an abacus to work on the counting involved, both of which she really enjoyed.

Lolly Sticks

This was a fantastic moment and it came up out of nowhere. We had some plain and coloured lolly sticks hanging about and out of nowhere a conversation came up about zero. I cut up some bits of paper with 0-20 written on them and asked her to count out the number of sticks for each one – she got it right, as I expected she would, including zero. The I showed her how to use a coloured one to represent 10 as our lolly stick supply was becoming limited. The breakthrough came when we got to 20 and she figured out how to use 2 coloured sticks to represent the two sets of 10 involved.

100 Square and Base 10

The photo at the top of the page shows you our most recent game. I made laminated cards of 0-100 and we have been laying them out with a number square to help, practising the names of the 10’s as well – Fran still tends to say “twenty ten” not “thirty”. Its a good fun game right now. We have a wooden base ten set and have spent some time looking at how units become tens and hundreds – its fun!

Puddle Maths 1

Below is a resume of 2002

Maths has been my greatest fear for HE because it was such a terror to me as a child. I still panic now if faced with maths to be done at speed and I find it hard to cope with “3D” maths – ie maths in the wild where I need to apply intelligent logical thought to a practical problem! I supoose I have been slightly bolstered by the fact that my husband is incredibly mathematically able and I felt initially that he would be able to help if I got stuck.

In reality, so far at least, maths has been a relearning journey for me and good fun to do with Fran. of course so far she is very young but I think its what we do now that will make the biggest difference, I am keen to make sure she enjoys maths so I carefully watch her mood and how we go about things. I think it was my anxieties about maths which made me investigate Montessori so thoroughly and I am incredibly glad I did… we use Montessori materials or methods a good bit but it has also given me the courage to make my own materials as I feel they will be useful. So far I have got it right!

Last year…

Before we had the bubba it was easier to do floor work – since she got mobile we have to pick our times. But we spent lots of time using manipulatives, both sensorial and mathematical. A big success, and one we still use were the counters and numerals. Excuse the blackout – my children always seem to do maths half clad!

Wooden Numerals and Counters bought from Opitec

Completed, it looked like this:-

We also spent lots of time using the Montessori(bought) knobless cylinders which my then two year old loved. There is so much to do with these – I really must do it!

In addition we have made Red Rods – although they tend (ahem!) to get used a bit violently so are under lock and key! Fran learned her number predominantly from an ELC number jigsaw of the peg board type (also learnt her letters this way).

MuddlePuddle Worksheets

Slightly to my horror, my daughter seems to really like worksheets! We have been using Singapore Maths at the Early Bird level (see Maths for more info) and backing it up with some UK shop bought books, such as the Letts ones. As these are quite expensive, I thought I would have a go at my own, using the topics that we cover in Singapore as a guide and spending time on the areas that Fran is finding harder. We are backing all this up with practical work as well as I don’t really like purely worksheet based stuff, but it does seem to be working for her – so long as she sees it as a game, I am happy!

Please note: these were made in 2002 and are distinctly vintage!

Here are the three sets, split into topics – there are six sheets in each.

I have used coloured graphics but you could print them in greyscale to save ink.

More or Less?

Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6

How many?

Counting 1-5 and 6-10 Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4

Writing numbers Page 1 Page 2 Page 3

Odd One Out

Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6

Big, Small and Middle Sized

Page 1 Page 2 Page 3 Page 4 Page 5 Page 6

Maths Stories 3

We got the cuisinaire rods about 2 weeks ago and Abigail (just 3) was really interested (Adrian, just 1, was too but they very soon ended up in his mouth…)

She looked at them, noticed the numbers underneath when she took them out, and basically played the whole time at taking them all out of the box… We helped put them back but maybe should have left her to it. I
must admit that I haven’t taken them out in the past week, couldn’t face tidying up all these rods! I should maybe give her more time and let her play with it. But I have noticed that she often needs us to do something with/for her at the beginning and then gradually, she will get more confident and try for herself, usually very successfully.

She has taken a real liking for jigsaw puzzles (maybe because we got some more difficult ones recently) and we had to do them with her first. Little by little, each time she asked for less and less help and in
about 5 gos she could do them by herself (24 pieces). If she is on her own she will do them very quickly, if we are around she will ask for help…

As for numbers, well she is really interested in them. I printed out some number lines and she loved showing that she could recognise the numbers on them. In the morning she also reads the time (the numbers,
separately) on our digital alarm clock. She spots some numbers here and there. I don’t do any formal work with her really, which in a way I feel bad about but there again, we tend to be autonomous so I want to let her find her own way.

As you can see, I still need to find my way round our “philosophy” and what to initiate. I don’t want to be teaching as it wouldn’t work, but I don’t know if we are doing enough. We’ll see.

An archive post from 2002 contributed by Laure.

Maths Stories 2

Abbie had an early interest in numbers that continued to grow as she learned more about how they worked. We started with number recognition games that concentrated on one-to-one correspondence. At first I would lay out cards that each had a numeral on them. We started with 1, 2, 3 and I showed her that we could put one bear (we used plastic counting bears but you could use anything from dried beans to M&M’s) on the 1, two on the 2, etc. We moved quickly through the numbers and in no time I could pick five random numbers, lay down the cards, and she would count out the correct number of bears for each card. Her awareness of adding began early when she told me that she had two biscuits and if I gave her one more biscuit then she would have three. Subtraction went hand in hand with addition and I decided to look into math curriculums.

At 3 ½ years old Abbie was very interested in writing things down. I think she felt important and grown up with a pencil in hand. She was very excited when her new math book arrived and was eager to complete a few (sometimes much more than a few) pages each day. We continued on with many of the games from Peggy Kaye’s ‘Games for Math’ and did a lot of work with manipulatives. We worked with pattern blocks, counting bears, linking cubes, beads, and anything we could find around the house. One of her favourite math games was the story game from Peggy Kay’s book. Whenever we walked anywhere I would tell her a story that could go something like this, ‘two bears were out in the woods and they got very hungry. The first bear suggested that they split up and each hunt for good things to eat. They decided to meet back at the cave when they were finished. The second bear went along the river. He scooped up a pink salmon as it swam past. Then another salmon swam past and he scooped it up too. How many salmon did he have? (child answers) The second bear went straight for the berry bushes. He collected 6 berries in one hand and two in the other. How many berries did he have altogether? Both bears were very happy with what they had found and went back to the cave. How many salmon did the first bear have? How many berries did the second bear have? How many things to eat did they have altogether?, etc, etc.’ We did this for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

At 4 ½ Abbie was ready to start the Grade 1 book. I ordered it but within a week I knew we would need something different. It was much the same as the kindergarten book, only more boring. It was simply page after page of math problems. I knew I didn’t want Abbie learning math by rote memorization, I wanted her learning in a more involved way. After careful research into many different math programs I decided on Singapore Math. The lessons are based on conceptual understanding instead of rote memorization. There is little repetition and it moves along at a quick pace. It has turned out to be the perfect curriculum for Abbie. She will be starting Singapore 3A in August.

I love the fact that her interest in math has continued to be so strong. It seems as though each time she encounters a new concept in her curriculum she finds ways to reinforce the learning through day to day living. She mentally calculates my purchases when I go to pick up a few things at the store and then she lets me know whether my change was correct or not. Her aunt was in a fashion show a couple of weeks ago and Abbie figured out that if there were ten girls in the show and each girl had to wear two outfits and each walk down the runway would take approximately 3 minutes then the fashion show would be one hour long. She looked up at my Risk board that had a picture of each of the three pieces around the number 360 and then told me that there were 120 of each piece. It’s those types of observations that make home-educating so exciting for me. I know she’s learning new things because I see her progress through her math books, but I know she’s loving the process when I hear how she is applying her knowledge to the world around her.

This is an archive post from 2002 contributed by Sarah and Abbie.