Since I'm stuck at home with my kids for the next (checks calendar) six months (AAAAAAAHHHH), I decided we'll work on math. They will already all read and write cheerfully, so that's not a problem, but our otherwise excellent public schools are pretty so-so on math.
The five year old enjoyed some DragonBox app, and wants to do it more tomorrow. For the older ones I printed off some of the Singapore Math placement tests.
The eight year old breezed through his in fifteen minutes; we'll try the next one up on Monday.
The eleven year old whined, stomped, and cried real tears over being asked to actually THINK about math. He's okay at calculating and they maybe didn't teach any of the other math skills? All the ones relating to number sense, estimating, mental math, and the things we as scientists think of as really fundamental.
Anyhow, it only took us an hour to get through distribution of terms, so this is gonna go great. I am VERY good at explaining complex calculations and experiments and so on to college students but, unsurprisingly, I am not good at this. Come back, public school teachers! We miss you!
I think this pandemic is making everyone really appreciate teachers and the work they do!
ReplyDeleteI loved them lots already but now I love them EXTRA.
Deletethis is so so true.
ReplyDeleteIs there enough for the 5 year old on the DragonBox app to be worth it for the long haul? I haven't bought any apps yet but I'm starting to consider it.
ReplyDeleteThere are a few apps, with levels. I'm not sure if they're worth it; since there are 3 of the kds, even paying for 2 apps would be worth it for a couple weeks of peaceful math (to me!) The main advantage is they don't need to be fluent readers to use it. I'll report back in a week; today was mostly taken up arguing with the oldest!
DeleteI vote get the package if they're still offering it. We have gotten hours and hours of enjoyment from all of them (including *cough* me) at different ages. And I finally memorized that 8+5 = 13 instead of having to rederive it (by splitting 5 into 2 and 3) every time I see it. The chess app is too hard for me and the kids haven't finished it yet, but all the other ones have been played multiple times by all three of us (DH has more sophisticated gaming tastes). Man, just thinking about it makes me want to pick apples.
DeleteLooks like package still exists but only on ios!
DeleteDC2 has been super grumpy most of the time she's awake and hanging out with us. I am concerned for next week when they start doing graded homework again for school. It probably hasn't helped that she's been sleeping in until noon. This weekend we're going to start setting her alarm again...
DeleteWell, all I can say is that I guess I have been reading your blog for a very long time. I think since your first kid was born? Wow. Where does the time actually GO?
ReplyDeleteI've been shocked and disappointed at the number of educated, sensible women on my FB feed who've been posting pics of their children's math homework where the homework is clearly trying to teach children the whys/hows/methods behind things, to help them understand the patterns of combinations, more efficient ways of doing calculations, and setting them up to be able to do things like estimation, and then complaining that the homework is so hard and why aren't the children just being taught how to do brute calculations?
ReplyDeleteSeeing some of the exercises being posted, I keep thinking, gosh, if I had learned these as a child, I might have had more interest in math because the ways in which numbers fit together is WAAAAAAY more interesting than doing calculations/word problems. (I am totally a theorist, not an applied mathematician!) It took until graduate school before I learned some of these things, and realised I actually liked math!
We talk about the whys and hows with G (now 8, but we started doing infinite cardinal and ordinal arithmetic when she was 4ish) all the time, and she seems to find it fascinating, too. The other day over dinner we taught her the sieve of Eratosthenes, which was a lot of fun!
The middle kid is super into math! My oldest is lazy about it and I'm starting to worry I've failed as a parent...
Delete