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Hi all my son is desperate to learn more math. He is in first grade but he wants to learn multiplication and division. He's been practicing the simple multiplication and division facts with games and "Timezattack" but he keeps complaining he wants more. So, I want to do something for him over the summer to help with that. The problem - I am awful at math. My husband is great but works a lot. SO can anyone recommend something for him? Kumon seems to be big around here - should I try that? He does have a writing disability (dygraphia and hypotonia). Thanks for any recommendations!

Mary,

My DDs did Kumon a while ago but we stopped it. 1st- It is drill, drill, drill. A lot of repetition. My DDs dread over that. And it costs a lot of money as well. We were spending >$400 a month for Math and reading for 2 kids.

Singapore Math books are cheap and the kids can take it around. My DD8 did it for fun during school (when they are doing Math calsswork. I am sure your DS finish his before anyone else.)

There are a lot of online resources (some with a fee and some free) I like Khan academy. Your DS can progress on his own pace and there are plenty of video lectures as well.

Thanks! I was just looking at the Kumon site and was thinking the same thing. DS hates too much drill. Plus I don't want anything too expensive b/c I will be paying for some expensive therapy to try to help with his dysgraphia and pprocessing skills issues.

I wish I knew what to do for him! He signed up for the summer math camp and he was like "okay will I finally get to learn more? Will I get to do multiplication and division?" The camp looks cute and fun and he's doing it with one of his best friends but I sort-of doubt it will be anything all that "new"...

I will look at Kahn. (Sigh - why can't he want to read all summer and learn foreign languages? that's all I wanted to do when I was his age. Math is not really something I can relate to LOL)

Kumon is boring but there is a role for it, I think. We just bought their books online, which is very cheap. At some point, your child has to get down cold math facts for addition, subtraction, and multiplication to really excel in math.
We did some Singapore Math for awhile plus Kumon sheets. For my 4th grader, I moved to workbooks from Brighter Child. They have very nice, simple workbooks about Algebra and Geometry, which are really good.

My boy is 5 and has been doing Kumon for about 3 months, they wouild not accept him until he was 5. This morning he asked me if I knew what a thousand plus a thousand is. He likes it, especially the one on one time with the instructor and being around other sharp kids, so I would recomend it. They start out a step or two below what the child already knows to build confidence.

try this game:

http://www.amazon.com/Think-Fun-1510-Math-Dice/dp/B0007LYKX0

There are some other good math games out there. My DS loves Farkle, which isn't exactly a math game but kind of.

In general, ThinkFun makes a ton of mathy/logic games which do not require writing, although they do use small motor skills to varying extents. They are great for my mathy 5yo who doesn't write much yet.

The iPad we got over the holidays has opened a Pandora's box of possibilities. There are sources for videos, audio, games, lessons, etc. DS is trying out a couple of different apps a day, settling into a couple (e.g. King of Math) and moving onto something else in other cases. And it isn't just math; last night we were watching a fairly deep three minute video on RNA replication, and he didn't want to head to storytime until he had finished the quiz on the video.

EPGY OE Math lectures are very matter-of-fact/to the point/no fluff - which could work great or not depending on the child. (Liking math a lot + some experience of learning math on his own could be a good predictor whether it would work for your child *MOSTLY ON HIS OWN*.)

(I'm elaborating on the MON's valid observation above. I do think EPGY OE Math is of very high quality.)

I wouldn't enroll him in Kumon - as noted above, it's huge on drill and repetition. We have one of our dds enrolled, but she needs the repetition - it is all worksheets and it would have been the end of our dysgraphic ds if we'd sent him there! I do like the early elementary Kumon workbooks, but not for a child with fine motor dysgraphia.

Our ds also can't stand listening to the Kahn academy videos.... He says it's the voice, but I think it also moves too slowly for him. That said, he's never looked at them for math, he's watched science videos.

Our dysgraphic ds after-schooled himself in math using Aleks. I do think it's worth a look for dysgraphic kids simply because it's all computer based, no writing, and for a child who picks up concepts quickly there isn't a ton of extra repetition of working problems required before advancing. Each lesson has a written explanation online, very basic, so even though you aren't into math, I'm guessing that you could help your ds when/if he needs it by reading the explanation. If you found something he likes, like double digit multiplication, for instance, or conversely somethng he had trouble with, you can create custom "quizzes" to give him extra practice. We found that the pie slice graphic where each module completed helps build a slice worked great for motivation for our kids too - they could easily see they were moving forward. the other thing that was extremely useful for me later on was the ability to generat reports showing what ds had mastered that are tied to stare curriculum standards... we were able to use those when advocating (successfully) to subject-accelerate ds in math.

Please know I'm not a sales rep for Aleks! It just worked very well for our ds.

Another idea - diversion! My ds was very curious at that age - he had so many things he wanted to learn about I couldn't keep up with it all.... However.... Because he had a lot of interests, when something like this came up, I was able to usually get his mind off of it by giving hm something else learning related to sink his teeth into and he'd forget about the other thing.

Good luck!

polarbear