Best way to approach math for a smart 5 year old?

[BethanyAnn4]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am new to teaching my children and am not sure what to do with my five year old girl. (Her birthday is February.) She she begs for "hard" work because she is very bored in Abeka 1st grade program. I told her multiplying is just taking the number as many times as it says. Well, she did the papers pictures above just from what I told her. Can any of you suggest a program I should enter her into that is more challenging? I don't want to push her too hard, but I certainly don't want to hold her back. She can also read extremely well. I believe can read many grades above her age level.

[Jackie]

I had told my five year old that multiplication was an array. We didn't talk about it much afterwards, but then when we got to learning multiplication this past summer, just after her sixth birthday, she already had taught herself tricks to quickly find about 2/3 of the multiplication facts. At least that was easy! :)

 

I would switch to a program that focuses on teaching concepts and then applies those concepts to problem sets. A few that are known for doing this are Singapore Primary, Math Mammoth, and Beast Academy. (Beast starts in 3rd grade, but you could play around with it. My 6yo is doing it now.)

 

Because she can read so well, I'd suggest feeding her math books. Not texts, but fun books. Livingmath.net has lists of them. A few that have been great successes here are the Stuart J. Murphy MathStart series, Sir Cumference series, Time-Life I Love Math series, Murderous Maths, Anno, Bedtime Math. Most of these teach concepts behind the math, or focus on out-of-the-box thinking. If you are a library user, call number 510 has these types of books on just about every elementary math topic you can think of. And, when you eventually run out of those, you can go to the same call number in the adult section.

 

We also play with supplementary programs that teach advanced concepts in simple ways. Hands on Equations, for example, teaches how variables work but with arithmetic that your daughter could likely easily do. Dragonbox apps teach the same thing a bit more abstractly.

[....]

Two of my kids aren't using a math curriculum (11 year-old and 9 year-old).  It's great - I actually wished I would've ditched the curricula earlier.  Our library has a several shelves of math readers and we've been working on books like The Perfectly Perilous Book of Math (my 11 year-old is enjoying the problems in that book).  I also made a Living Math Notebook for my reference with lists of math topics.  I've just been going down the list teaching them different topics and then finding activities with the cuisinaire rods to go with it...or finding math readers that go with the topic.

 

Just one idea...   

[purpleowl]

For my DD#2 (turning 5 in a couple days):

* Moved through A Beka 1st grade math at an accelerated pace (she generally did 2 lessons per day), and more or less on her own with occasional instruction when a new concept came up (in other words, I didn't follow their curriculum guide for instructing, just let DD have at the worksheets and helped when necessary)

 

* Then went to Math Mammoth 2A (she's got a chapter left in this and then will do 2B)

 

* She wants desperately to do Beast Academy like her big sister. Big sis did MM through 4A and then went to BA 3A (because that's when I finally decided to buy it), but DD#2 will likely move to BA earlier than that. She has already been reading the BA guide books for 3A-3D and talks about things she's learned from them.

 

* We definitely hit the J510 section at the library frequently! David A. Adler's math books are particularly fun for her. Also, she is perfectly happy to read about something she doesn't completely understand. Bits and pieces stick with her and then she processes and eventually gets the concepts really well. 

 

 

One thing my DD#1 (almost 8) has always enjoyed doing is when she figures out something new (like your DD figuring out multiplication), she has me take a video of her explaining it. I only share the videos with DH and grandparents, but it makes DD happy. 

 

I don't know for certain that any of that is The Best Way even for my own children, much less someone else's! But maybe it will be helpful for you to see what someone else is doing/has done. :)

[Sarah0000]

We do a lot of math books as well. I've also bought a few different workbooks that are self explanatory like Beast Academy and Key to... so DS does them by himself. About every six weeks I ask him to do some standard arithmetic problems for practice and to build up endurance for the type of work that using a regular curriculum entails. I hope that someday we can use a regular curriculum because it would just be easier, but right now at five years old it's just not fitting.

 

But your daughter was willing to do sheets of problems! My son would never do that even when he immediately knows all the answers. Yours might do fine with a standard curriculum that you accelerate through to a point that feels at the right challenge level.

[rose]

MEP would probably suit her well. So much of it is problem solving and pressing the use of the new facts in as many directions as possible.