Laura Corin Posted May 11, 2009 Share Posted May 11, 2009 Right at the end of 4A, there's the section on the areas of irregular shapes. Both boys did fine with 'rectangles with other rectangles cut out of the sides' but both have been all over the place with 'areas of borders'. Calvin has a hard time visualising things, so when he had trouble, lo these many years ago, I thought it was just him. Then along came Hobbes, who has no such difficulties, and he's just as stymied. He understands how to do it in theory, but he keeps forgetting to add/subtract the width of the border TWICE in order to find out the correct lengths and widths. Is this just confusing or is there a family 'can't calculate the border' gene? Laura Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
swimnactmom Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 My ds did the same thing but eventually he caught on after he kept getting it wrong. They've only gotten it wrong twice? You beat us by a mile! It might help if you made this tactile. Try using string or other household goodies to construct the border of a pretend garden, playground, or something else they'd like. Make it surrounded by water filled with crocodiles or a man-eating snake. You can do a real activity in the backyard or in a sandbox or on the beach. My ds did a picture because I thought it might be too dangerous to bring in that snake. Let them get some real measurements of their masterpiece. They will most likely remember how to measure their borders after that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mamato3 all-boy boys Posted May 12, 2009 Share Posted May 12, 2009 ...Make it surrounded by water filled with crocodiles or a man-eating snake. You can do a real activity in the backyard or in a sandbox or on the beach. ...... Ooh, we are just about to tackle this topic at the end of this week. DS will **love** the visual! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Laura Corin Posted May 12, 2009 Author Share Posted May 12, 2009 My ds did the same thing but eventually he caught on after he kept getting it wrong. They've only gotten it wrong twice? You beat us by a mile! It's just that he doesn't get that he needs to include the width of the border twice (once for each side) to get the full width of the complete area. I'll try your idea, thanks. Laura Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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