Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Math Presentations Schedule

This week we switched from using Shiller Math back to....

 Life of Fred!! Why? Shiller Math is moving the kids too fast away from concepts. For example one day Ken was working on the Parts of the Circle about three weeks ago and then she moved to learning about decimals to have only been left hanging learning the chord of the circle, etc. I know some like spiraling curricula, where you touch on one thing and then come back. My kids don't learn well this way. They say they enjoy working with Shiller Math, but I can see how this is preventing them from being able to go deeper into concepts. I don't think we will be leaving Shiller Math behind  forever I can see us coming back to this when they reached abstraction of the concepts and use it as a review. It isn't your normal workbook at all and this is the part of it that Ken and DJ enjoy. Every other day we will do a chapter of Life of Fred together, they welcomed this idea and have suggested just to start at the beginning of the book that they were last working on.

On the other days we will be using our most beloved Montessori math materials. This week Ken has had a presentation on The Power of Numbers.
 She rocked it! and Loved it!! Ken talks in squared language now:)

DJ is just the kind of kid that devours anything you come at with him. He loves a challenge and he ran over to me when he saw me setting up this work. He thoroughly enjoyed writing huge numbers while becoming familiar with the Long Bead Frame.

 
The Long Bead Paper was a free download from Homeschool Escapade. I have misplaced our paper and was very happy to be able to find a copy of this for free.

 Now we have a math schedule that is creating expectations for both the kids and I .On Mondays and Wednesdays we will do Life of Fred together. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I will be giving them both individual Math Presentations and on Fridays both of them together with receive Geometry presentations. Sure they may do math whenever they choose, but it is very comforting to know that Math will be a part of our everyday school schedule. We have decided we like our math fun, focused, and humorous!!

I am linking this post to Montessori Monday.                                                                               
                                                                                                                                     

3 comments:

  1. We use Life of Fred (with Montessori materials) too - it is so attractive to children ;) (and we throw in other things whenever it makes sense to do so).

    I agree with you about the curriculum that introduce, then review later and repeatedly. They have their place and their benefits, but some of them I have noticed tend to introduce a concept on a relatively superficial level, then continue to review/repeat later - but since the child didn't get to go deep with it, when coming back to it, he learns it again (but still only superficially) - so in the end, there isn't any real learning, despite the ideas of "repetition" and "review".

    but I love homeschooling - we can pick and choose and adjust and adapt wherever and whenever we need to for the sake of the children's learning :)

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  2. Thank you for sharing this! Although my son goes to public school, and I have some Montessori math materials at home, he still needs a lot of options for learning math as he has Down syndrome. An 'all of the above' approach seems to work best for him. Again, thanks for sharing more math options!

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