Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Best & worst math curriculums (and those between)

Go math here. Can't give any information except son doesn't complain and shows progress each time they test him (and they test a lot).

I think he does his assignment quickly and the spends his waiting time on different math websites on the computer in the back of the room...that may be where he actually learns new stuff.

My daughter is in 6th grade and didn't do Everyday Math since 2nd Grade. She's in Accelerated Algebra so I don't think she will have anything to do with Go Math anyways but the school district here is one of the better ones

We have the NZ national curriculum. It specifies topic and standards but not texts. There are texts to go along with them but I haven't found anyone who used them. The result is we have no idea what the kids are or aren't learning. Can you tell I am getting grumpy?

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Maybe *some* kids need to have their math facts down before attempting multi-digit multiplication, but not all kids. DS would have gone nuts if we had withheld showing him long multiplication and division until he had mastery of his times tables. In fact, practicing long multiplication problems turned out to be a great way to practice his math facts. [/quote]

Agreed. DD4.5 still has a hard time doing 3+4 but takes under a second to do 343+434. Also, re: Singapore math, I just got the 2A and 2B workbooks and DD is not too thrilled. There actually seems to be a lot of repetitions as they try to approach the same concept from different angles. I am letting her skip most of it and sometimes just do the review section to keep her engaged.

Many of the conceptual math programs run into this issue... if you are using their methods you have to buy into it and can't revert back to what you learned in school...

For a problem like 96x8 they probably don't expect you to use the long multiplication algorithm... that certainly isn't how *I* would solve it.

Now lets see.... 96*8
Well if the kid already has an ok grasp of place value they probably know 100*8=800. So 96*8 is 4 less 8s. So 8x4=32, thats either memorized of easily figured out. So 800-32, well thats subtraction. If multidigit subtraction has been covered you're all set.

Singapore, Math Mammoth, MEP, and at higher levels AOPS are very big on mental math strategies. If the problems seem very tedious or too difficult for the age range, you are probably doing it wrong and should look for an easier approach. This allows kids to build deeper number sense and problem solving skills. However, if you take a Singapore workbook and try to teach it using a traditional American style... well thats not going to work.

I didn't buy the Singapore Math textbook which is probably part of the problem with there seeming to be large gaps. I'm not sure how the textbook teaches them to do divison for example. In DS's 3A workbook in exercise 34 there are problems like 28/7. DS has this memorized, or if he didn't, he could skip count by 7's, so no problem. Then a couple pages later it is 803/7. I'm not sure if they are expecting kids to write this out the long way or do it in their head or what. I told DS to forget about writing it out the long way. 7 goes into 8 one time so write a 1 above the 8. There is 1 left over so write a little one in front of the zero. Now you have a 10. 7 goes into 10 1 time. Write a 1 above the 0. There's 3 left over. Write a 3 in front of the other 3 so you have a 33. 7 goes into 33 4 times, and you have 5 left over. That's your remainder. So then his first grade teacher put him on the computer to do above level testing and started sending home problems like convert 546 inches into feet. She attached graph paper for him to "show his work." I had to explain to her that I didn't teach him how to do long division the normal way, he wouldn't know what to write on graph paper. But I will try.

blackcat, you might try this report about enVision: http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/wwc/interventionreport.aspx?sid=618 Our district uses it and I think it's ok, though I've seen a few worksheets that required some non-math-related knowledge to get a correct mathematical answer which I felt might be unfair to some kids. FWIW the web archive page you linked seems to be dated 1999.

I think maybe - 803/7.

Well more than a 100, 7*100 =700
103/7. Well 7 *10=70, 4*7=28, 70+28 =98
So 100+10+4=114 with 5 left over.

That I can do in my head.

Aufilia--thanks for the link. That makes me feel somewhat better about it.

puffin--i wonder if that's what Singapore Math teaches them to do. I think that's what DS is doing when he multiplies large numbers, like 96X12. But he makes too many errors so the teacher is trying to get him to write it down and carry numbers the normal way. For a kid with good working memory it probably is fine but he is only in first grade and has pretty average working memory so that's probably why it's a problem. I tell him it's fine to do it in his head, but can he please write it the normal way afterwards to check his answer.

Whoa. I don't get this at all. Brains are weird.