Ds7, who loved math, is now finding it "dull"-am I moving too slowly or what? HELP!

[HappyGrace]

It can't be the curriculum-we are using a combo of several to explore concepts different ways and also stay at his level-I use some CLE2, Singapore 2a, MM2, and MEP. I am a confident teacher and I draw from each of these, or other manipulative, etc., to teach the concept how I know it will work best for him.

 

I'm wondering if it's too easy-he's pretty advanced but I want to make sure these early foundational steps are cemented well.

 

But for instance, yesterday we were doing Singapore 2a where it teaches regrouping. This is brand new for him. I knew he could visualize it better if I pulled out my Noble Knights of Knowledge math board that uses individual jewels for the 1s, and 10 strips of jewels for the 10s and so on. I was ready to go slowly to make sure he got it but he picked it up immediately and within ten minutes was regrouping into the hundreds, and today did into the thousands easily.

 

Should I be moving more quickly or do I need to worry about cementing this stuff first or what? He does like the Singapore IP problems, so I'm thinking about pulling out my Zaccaro Primary Challenge Math?

 

I'm just not sure how to keep that love for math. I know sometimes work is just dull, and I'm not one that thinks it has to be "fun" all the time, but he is not a complainer-I really think he is trying to tell me something that he needs.

Thanks a lot if you've read this far!

Edited September 29, 2010 by HappyGrace

[HappyGrace]

Just found the "math lab" thread-I think that might help! Off to read more!

 

Still looking for ideas!

[Spy Car]

It can't be the curriculum-we are using a combo of several to explore concepts different ways and also stay at his level-I use some CLE2, Singapore 2a, MM2, and MEP. I am a confident teacher and I draw from each of these, or other manipulative, etc., to teach the concept how I know it will work best for him.

 

I'm wondering if it's too easy-he's pretty advanced but I want to make sure these early foundational steps are cemented well.

 

But for instance, yesterday we were doing Singapore 2a where it teaches regrouping. This is brand new for him. I knew he could visualize it better if I pulled out my Noble Knights of Knowledge math board that uses individual jewels for the 1s, and 10 strips of jewels for the 10s and so on. I was ready to go slowly to make sure he got it but he picked it up immediately and within ten minutes was regrouping into the hundreds, and today did into the thousands easily.

 

Should I be moving more quickly or do I need to worry about cementing this stuff first or what? He does like the Singapore IP problems, so I'm thinking about pulling out my Zaccaro Primary Challenge Math?

 

I'm just not sure how to keep that love for math. I know sometimes work is just dull, and I'm not one that thinks it has to be "fun" all the time, but he is not a complainer-I really think he is trying to tell me something that he needs.

Thanks a lot if you've read this far!

 

If your boy is like mine Grace (and we have also started Primary Mathematics 2A recently) when he thinks the problems are too easy the interest tends to flag. So having more challenging materials at hand, such as the IP books and others) does have a good effect.

 

The introductory lessons had a little "been there/done that quality" so I'd say do what you need to do to keep him on his toes. That's my tactic anyway.

 

Bill

[HappyGrace]

Thanks, Bill. What are some of the tricks up your sleeve for this? We're already doing some RS games, etc. I think we need more stuff like the IP. (He likes the challenge stuff in the IP, not so much the regular practice.)

 

And how are you keeping a balance between parking long enough to make sure the concepts are cemented and keeping him interested? For instance, I'd rather go more in depth with +/- at this point before jumping into mult/dividing. At least for awhile. So I guess I'm going for depth rather than breadth.

[regentrude]

For instance, I'd rather go more in depth with +/- at this point before jumping into mult/dividing. At least for awhile. So I guess I'm going for depth rather than breadth.

 

How were you planning to "go in depth with addition and subtraction"? CAN he add and subtract? Can he add and subtract multi-digit numbers? Can he solve word problems using addition and subtraction? If so, belaboring +/- more will probably bore him. (Unless, of course, you use this moment to introduce him to negative numbers.)

I am sure your book provides practice problems. If he can do them easily, I would see no need to "cement" anything further. You can always come back to addition and subtraction every now and then... if your program does not compartmentalize completely, those skills should pop up anyway throughout the course of studies.

[HappyGrace]

Thank you , Regentrude-this is exactly the kind of thing I need to know. I guess I'm wondering, for instance with the regrouping, he just yesterday and today learned how to do it-I showed him and he understood it right away-can do it on paper and with manipulatives-so I guess I have him practice that for awhile, what, a week or two? I can't just show him how to do it and move on if he understands the concept, right, he'll need some practice? You're saying just maybe spend a little more time so he shows mastery of regrouping with adding and subtracting and then move forward?

 

This is so foreign to me-older dd was completely the opposite-took FOREVER to learn every concept.

[Dmmetler]

2A is very repetitive when it's introducing addition/subtraction with regrouping, gradually building up. I'd do just the IP and go from there, then move on to new topics.

[regentrude]

Give him a few practice problems of increasing difficulty. If he does them all correctly and quickly, he has mastered the concept. I would see no need to have him do it over and over again for two more weeks.

My DS "sees" math intuitively - he can figure things out before I show him the "correct" procedure. How deal with it: we progress with the new material quickly and give a few review problems of the old stuff mixed in with the new homework. This way, he gets his practice while still being excited about learning new things.

[Diviya]

Go faster! If he gets it, keep moving. I'm not familiar with the other curricula, but in Singapore, all the concepts are revisited regularly in the reviews. It will be clear if he's forgotten something. For my daughter, I let her go as fast as she cared to, using just the workbooks, until we reached a level where the concepts were really new, and not just incrementally different. Any additional review absolutely turned her off. For reference, she went from 2A through 4B in less than 6 months. 4A was when we had to slow down a bit. This was accompanied by drilling to cement the math facts.

 

Hope that helps.

[EKS]

Lately we have been moving very quickly through Singapore. My son does 2+ lessons in the textbook every day and no workbook. I have him review by doing a few problems from the practice pages each day (or sometimes we do a whole practice page in one day). Right now he is doing problems from three different practice pages in addition to the lessons. We skip the reviews. Then after he finishes a book, we go back and do all the reviews (5-10 problems/day) as well as half of the Challenging Word Problems book for the previous level.

 

I intentionally delay the reviews because when they come so quickly throughout the book, I can't tell what has stuck and what hasn't. Doing them a few months later helps to tease out what has been forgotten.

 

This is a fairly extreme approach. But it's working here, and if he forgets something later on, it's not a big deal, I'll just review as necessary.

Edited September 29, 2010 by EKS

[Spy Car]

Thanks, Bill. What are some of the tricks up your sleeve for this? We're already doing some RS games, etc. I think we need more stuff like the IP. (He likes the challenge stuff in the IP, not so much the regular practice.)

 

And how are you keeping a balance between parking long enough to make sure the concepts are cemented and keeping him interested? For instance, I'd rather go more in depth with +/- at this point before jumping into mult/dividing. At least for awhile. So I guess I'm going for depth rather than breadth.

 

I guess that I like to stay flexible. I'm generally a completest when it comes to covering the lessons in Primary Math, but I'm always keen for a diversion that essentially tests the same concepts from another angle and will pick up one of the supplementary programs we use, or make something up when I want to put the knowledge to the test of being mastered when the presentation is different than the usual pattern.

 

In the past week or so we've been reading some the Indian math books that Stripe mentioned were available. They often have "Cricket themes" and since my son is one of exceedingly few who is learning (and loving) this sport, he finds it fun figure out such things as:

 

If India is chasing Sri Lanka's 255 runs, and has 128 runs, how much do they need to win?

 

My son didn't pick up the re-grouping of numbers to ease mental calculations such as 43 - 8 to 33 and 10 - 8 fully, until we broke out the rods and he ran though the process that way first.

 

Then there was a break through and this has become a strong skill.

 

I have more to say...but it is homework time.

 

Bill

[kalanamak]

I knew he could visualize it better if I pulled out my Noble Knights of Knowledge math board that uses individual jewels for the 1s, and 10 strips of jewels for the 10s and so on.

 

I'm just not sure how to keep that love for math. I know sometimes work is just dull, and I'm not one that thinks it has to be "fun" all the time, but he is not a complainer-I really think he is trying to tell me something that he needs.

Thanks a lot if you've read this far!

 

FYI, my son always has found manipulatives slow and cumbersome. When I want to see if kiddo looking bored is him lost or bored, I ask him a question about cats. "If I have 10 cats, and each has 4 kittens, how many cats do I have." If he is lost, he'll talk about the cats. If not, he'll pop out with the answer. If he does, I move the talk up a notch. If he doesn't, I'll tell him we obviously need a little more attention paid, so he can solve the cat problem.

 

(Of course, adapt this to your son's love.)

[HappyGrace]

I'm so glad others have btdt! I am going to try moving a little faster. I like the idea of doing the reviews later to see if concepts have stuck. And he does not seem to need the manips for long; I guess I've just been overteaching to make sure he understands all this foundational place value stuff.

 

It's really encouraging to see that others are moving faster, with good results. I'm very glad I asked! I didn't realize we could move quite that quickly. Thank you!

[HappyGrace]

a little bump

[blessedmom3]

I use CLE, beestar.com and Singapore .

My son "complains" that CLE is too easy (easier than CLE 100 -last Lu's) while Singapore hard . Sometimes I feel like giving up with CLE because it's just so much drill but he does need that . He is a strong visual print learner and works best with an incremental math . My son likes CLE , especially the speed drills but I feel it's not challenging enough for him.

 

I would say take a break from CLE and do some math games such as those in the HIG's .

[In The Great White North]

I can't just show him how to do it and move on if he understands the concept, right, he'll need some practice?

 

If you read some of the AoPS threads, you see a lot of kids who can't stand doing "endless" practice on what they already get. "Endless" is, of course, defined differently by each child (anywhere from 2 to 200.) They do just "show him how to do it and move on."

 

Our challenge is to walk the fine line between enough practice to be sure he'll remember it, but not enough to bore him. Just to make it easy on us, this amount will change from child to child, day to day and topic to topic.

[FO4UR]

:bigear:

 

My ds7 gets the concepts with extreme ease. He told me how to regroup before I really taught it.:001_huh: I worked myself up to teach mutliplication for a "duh, mom!" moment.:tongue_smilie:

 

He has troubles that I think are directly related to dyslexia though. A page of MM (year 1, mind you....stuff he did in Kindy) takes effort on his part. It's the reading of the page, the knowing where to write and what size. (He's done some vision therapy too...) So, I am trying to juggle the reading, practice, and yet not stagnate him conceptually.

 

Do I take him as far and as fast as he can go and let the reading/writing aspects catch up later?

 

Do I back track and let the math be easy while he works on these related skills?

 

Do I continue to try and balance it all??? (and this explains why *I* use multiple maths :lol:)

 

sigh...

[8filltheheart]

:bigear:

 

My ds7 gets the concepts with extreme ease. He told me how to regroup before I really taught it.:001_huh: I worked myself up to teach mutliplication for a "duh, mom!" moment.:tongue_smilie:

 

He has troubles that I think are directly related to dyslexia though. A page of MM (year 1, mind you....stuff he did in Kindy) takes effort on his part. It's the reading of the page, the knowing where to write and what size. (He's done some vision therapy too...) So, I am trying to juggle the reading, practice, and yet not stagnate him conceptually.

 

Do I take him as far and as fast as he can go and let the reading/writing aspects catch up later?

 

Do I back track and let the math be easy while he works on these related skills?

 

Do I continue to try and balance it all??? (and this explains why *I* use multiple maths :lol:)

 

sigh...

 

Don't let his reading and writing abilities slow him down.

 

My 14 yos was very much like that when he was little. He was a very late reader (end of 3rd grade before listening to him read was not pure torture;)) OTOH, he was very advanced in math. I used to have to read him word problems b/c the vocabulary in the books far exceeded his reading abilities, but he could definitely do the math.

 

FWIW.....you might want to read a little about asynchronous development b/c it might be what you are seeing (hard to tell based on just a few sentences.)

[FO4UR]

Don't let his reading and writing abilities slow him down.

 

My 14 yos was very much like that when he was little. He was a very late reader (end of 3rd grade before listening to him read was not pure torture;)) OTOH, he was very advanced in math. I used to have to read him word problems b/c the vocabulary in the books far exceeded his reading abilities, but he could definitely do the math.

 

FWIW.....you might want to read a little about asynchronous development b/c it might be what you are seeing (hard to tell based on just a few sentences.)

 

Asynchronous development sounds like a perfect description of my sweet boy!;) Off to google...

 

Thanks for affirming my intuitions about keeping him moving ahead (and pray we don't move to a state where he has to test anytime soon). I follow your posts when I see them...I don't know if I'm relieved or scared that your 14yo was a mathy kid who couldn't read well until 3rd grade.:scared::tongue_smilie:

[EKS]

(and pray we don't move to a state where he has to test anytime soon).

 

If you do, the PASS test is good because you can test at separate levels for math, reading, and language, and it doesn't have a time limit. I used this for a few years with my dyslexic son who was a few years ahead in math in 3rd grade and it worked well.

[KAR120C]

I'm all for cementing concepts and being thorough, but at the arithmetic level there's not a whole lot of "meat" to get through. If he can do it he can do it and you can move on. Honestly, I wouldn't worry too much even after one day of subtraction with regrouping. Of course he'll forget some part of it, but you know already he can learn it in a day, so the second time around shouldn't be too much of a hiccup in your schedule... and the second time he learns it should stick even better than the first.

 

The way we did that with Singapore was to run the word problems (CWP) about six months to a year behind the regular work. That way I knew he was going to see all the topics again after a pretty good interval and I would know if he needed any reteaching. Occasionally it took a reminder of one thing or another, but nothing significant. I always had the old textbooks and workbooks handy with whatever problems we had skipped on our first pass, just waiting for when we'd need to go back and do more... and I don't think I pulled them out more than once.

 

So my general rule of thumb is if you're doing a solid math program with plenty of problem-solving (word problems etc.) and you're doing it thoroughly (understanding the concepts, having quick recall of the facts), then I have no qualms about accelerating the pace when a topic is getting easy. Even massively accelerating when a whole string of topics is easy. There is so much more meat to math at the algebra level... Even just getting into the very beginning of it opens up all kinds of fascinating stuff. Arithmetic you need to do, but if you can get through it fast? all the better.

[HappyGrace]

Now that I read that, I am remembering when I first started hs'ing I read in some book (maybe a John Holt book?) where one girl's father taught her all of basic elementary arithmetic in one year (it was like 5th grade, or something).

 

Thank you for the encouragement! I like the idea of using the CWP behind to "catch" any missed topics. Certainly if they can apply it in a word problem (especially those in CWP), they own the concept.

 

Yesterday we just did the mental math problems and some work in the 2a IP, and he liked that a LOT better. I think what I *might* do is read through the HIG myself and then just teach him the concepts right from the IP, only referring him back to the text and wkbk if necessary. I'm still thinking it through though.