Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Learning multiplication using fingers?

I have just heard about an age old method of using your fingers to learn multiplication. Many people use it for kids who are "visual learners". It is also used as a way to help kids learn in a fun and dynamic way. Sounds like a bad idea for kids who could just learn the tables. Any thoughts? My dd needs to learn her tables by the fall.

Finger math is fun, but it can not replace automaticity with basic math facts.

ALEKS' QuickTables provides an excellent way to learn all the tables, and by automatically focusing on the problem areas, it is faster than most other tools I've come across.

This is one of the better articles... just happens to be @ one of our favorite sites:
Why Memorize Math Facts @ Hoagies

(and I love the author's little tag at the end about learning Greek & Latin roots!)

Great! Thanks for the resouce recommendation!

http://www.hunkinsexperiments.com/pages/multiplication.htm

I think it's harder to learn multiplication on your fingers (I'm guessing the link is what you're talking about), because there's a lot of mental math involved.

I know the 9 tables are extremely easy to learn with your fingers, but it's a bit of a cheat. I'm not sure about the rest.:/

yes that is the idea. it looked pretty complicated to me too.

I would say yes she is a visual learner. The book looks very cool. I will look it up at the library. Thanks!

my older daughter learned multiplication by memory, but my younger one DD4 is more visual I haven't gotten to multiplication with her yet but I do use an abacus with her for adding and subtracting, once she can visualize something then she can do it without the abacus, something to try?

My DD learned fingers and skip counting for multiplication & division. I like that she learned this way because I feel she better understands the concept of what the numbers are doing.
There are many kids out there who have their times tables memorized and have no clue what it represents and how those numbers work in the world.
But of course what works for us may not work for you.

great post! My little guy is a very visual learner and wants SO badly to learn the multiplication tables but just can not memorize things (one of the really cool parts that we liked about his old montessori school was with their math, the kids learned the why behind the math and didn't just memorize)....but I am have a doozy of a time trying to come up with a way to help him learn them...thanks for the great post and links!