Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Homeschooling: How to handle math?

You can still go deep once you hit 4+ grade. Singapore Challenging Word Problems are marvelous. Zaccaro books are really good. Any books about logic, infinity, probability can be a good choice. There are quite a few options before moving onto algebra.

Wow, this is *exactly* the kind of stuff I was hoping to find, different ways to think about what he already knows or completely different paths all together!

Cryptography sounds right up his alley- he's been creating his own codes and cyphers and giving me messages to decode lately.

The Business Math program from Charlotte Mason looks great, too!

I didn't realize that Math Olympiad had elementary level problems, which I think might be exactly the kinds of problems I want him to learn to solve. It uses basic math he already knows, but he has to get creative and manipulate it in new ways.

Using Singapore and Alex to review and take care of gaps is a good idea, so rather than use them as our primary teaching programs (which we've done both in the past), we can use them as needed at or slightly below level.

I know he already doesn't love math and I would think that if I push him forward, it's not going to help any. The Life of Fred: Fractions has been great, he actually enjoys it a lot and I want to do the next book LOF: Decimals, too. But that's only maybe 6 months worth of work before the 3rd book which is Algebra. So, I'm hoping that we can fill in with other things and get a year or 18mo between the lower level LOF books and the problem solving type resources you guys have suggested.

And I'm still confused on how a not-PG kid is running through math like this? I didn't really believe we were this far ahead until he did an online assessment (Let's Go Learning) and it put him at Grade 5.25 and the test only goes to end of 5th grade. I'm just not *that* fabulous of a teacher, lol!

I'm feeling a lot calmer about this now though, I can see there are a lot more resources out there than what I had found before and they definitely add some depth and breadth to what we've already done.

Thank you all (and if anyone has more suggestions, I'll take all I can get)!

Kimberly

One more thought, Kimberly, given that he likes Fred--I read on another board that Stan Schmidt is writing another book to slide in between Decimals and Algebra--maybe it will be done in time for you? You could always email him and see how far along it is--he's very approachable.

peace
minnie

Two other thoughts..... My DS does a lot of math while working on Astronomy. Charting and so forth. Another thing would be to do mapping, you could even map your own yard and he can learn coordinates etc.

Sort of OT but following along the arithmetic and various curricula....

I've been using Rightstart math with my boys. It's similar conceptually to Singapore Math but differs in scope and sequence. The entry levels A and B (you can start in B w/ a 1st grader or A with a Ker) goes all the way to 4 digit addition. Every so often RIghtstart includes some conceptual tidbit which goes beyond arithmetic. I'm always surprised when my boys make that leap and it's easy as pie. It offers things like tangrams and lots of geometry. The drawing tools are fun to play with. It includes a drawing board, 30-60 triangle, 45-triangle, and a T-square. It's first introduced in level C. Level E begins w/ several lessons on magic squares. Tessellations come up at some point. It also uses check numbers for checking answers to add/sub/multi/div which I've never seen in any other program. It's in Singapore Math but it's one of the supplement problem solving books. the last level, the Geometric approach has units on Koch snowflake, Pythagorean theorem, Fibonacci spiral, Escher, reflections, symmetry etc. I don't have that level yet but it looks intriguing!

the issue I've had w/ RS is that it moves a bit slow. ALthough I think that's b/c I've always been trying to catch up to my son. THe way RS is written, it's not easy to compact or skip around like SM. But I love how it gives a problem that the child has to use all available knowledge to figure out - the strategy wasn't taught explicitly.

Oooh! That is nice!

What is nice?

This:

OH that's what I assumed but wanted to make sure lol. Yes, I think she made the distinction at some point about exercises vs problem solving...which I just read again in AoPS website.

I agree with Dottie's recommendation.