brijen97 Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 Hi! We have been working with Saxon Math and trying to get the timed fact tests completed in the amount of time they ask. 5 minutes for 100 addition or subtraction problems. My daughter is 7 going to be 8 and we are going into Saxon 3. We have continued to work on the timed tests over the summer using More Minute Math drills from Carson-Dellosa. She is still not doing well. It just took her 6 minutes to do 60 problems subtracting 1,2, or 3 for example. I am wondering what someone else may have done that has had this trouble. We are playing board games like crazy in the hopes that it will help. It has seemed to help with addition but not so much subtraction. We keep telling her if she knows one she knows the other but that isn't sinking in either! :tongue_smilie: Any thoughts would be appreciated! I do understand why she needs to know them quickly too....we get into the higher math and it can take forever while she tryies to remember answers.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mommy22alyns Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 :lurk5: We're just plugging away. We use CLE, which builds to about 32 addition/subtraction/multiplication problems in 2 minutes for 2nd grade. In 3rd grade, the number of problems goes up and the time goes down to 1 minute! Becca is getting better at her subtraction times, but it's an ongoing effort. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NanceXToo Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 Personally, I'm not a fan of timed tests. I'd rather them do them right and get it than have to rush trying to get something done within a certain time period. I also think 7/8 years old is still on the young side and that this type of thing will probably automatically become easier as she gets a bit older and begins to understand more. Further, I think 100 math problems for a 7 year old is ridiculous. Actually, I thought it was ridiculous for my 10 y/o too- the insane number of problems in a lesson was one of the reasons why I wanted nothing to do with Saxon myself last year. heh. Anyway- I would just encourage her to do her best and see what happens over the course of the year, if she automatically gets faster as time goes on or what. But I wouldn't make it into a huge issue or make her feel like she's inadequate at math or any such thing (I'd be VERY careful not to give that impression to her), I'd just praise her for the ones she did get done. And maybe somewhere down the road you see she's doing 65 or 70 instead of 60 and you can tell her that you noticed she's improved her time and that's great. But I wouldn't want to turn this into a huge deal for a 7 year old if it were me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wapiti Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 I'm not a fan of timed tests either. You keep plugging away at learning the facts, preferrably through fun means, but Faster Isn't Smarter. Also, there's some difference between not knowing the facts and taking longer to do the problems. An example would be a student with slow processing speed (one example would be one of my ds8s, who is very talented at math - but slow on timed tests. Doesn't mean he doesn't know his facts). Certainly, I wouldn't keep a student from moving forward based on the timed tests. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spy Car Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 It can be a very dangerous game. The child gets stressed>slows down>feels like a failure>thinks she is stupid>bad at math>hates math. Bill Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brijen97 Posted July 21, 2011 Author Share Posted July 21, 2011 Yup-I do get that we don't want to weigh her down with and certainly aren't....at least I don't think we are! Maybe its the ex-public school teacher in me but I want her to get these down so she can answer in a reasonable amount of time. Sitting there waiting for over a minute for her to give me the answer to 1+1 or 2+3 is a very patience eating thing for both of us. If they were 2 or 3 digit problems I would have my doubts about timing it and having the time limit. I guess the best answer is to just keep plugging along as we have been doing to work towards mastery. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spy Car Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 Yup-I do get that we don't want to weigh her down with and certainly aren't....at least I don't think we are! Maybe its the ex-public school teacher in me but I want her to get these down so she can answer in a reasonable amount of time. Sitting there waiting for over a minute for her to give me the answer to 1+1 or 2+3 is a very patience eating thing for both of us. If they were 2 or 3 digit problems I would have my doubts about timing it and having the time limit. I guess the best answer is to just keep plugging along as we have been doing to work towards mastery. Have you tried playing something like "Addition War" (like the card game War, but you play two "non-face" cards, and the higher sum wins)? Or other card games, dice games, electronic games, or other non-stressful ways to work on speed and practice? Bill Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mommy22alyns Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 Yup-I do get that we don't want to weigh her down with and certainly aren't....at least I don't think we are! Maybe its the ex-public school teacher in me but I want her to get these down so she can answer in a reasonable amount of time. Sitting there waiting for over a minute for her to give me the answer to 1+1 or 2+3 is a very patience eating thing for both of us. If they were 2 or 3 digit problems I would have my doubts about timing it and having the time limit. I guess the best answer is to just keep plugging along as we have been doing to work towards mastery. You know, Becca actually does better adding and subtracting 2-3 digit numbers than single digit ones. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brijen97 Posted July 21, 2011 Author Share Posted July 21, 2011 Have you tried playing something like "Addition War" (like the card game War, but you play two "non-face" cards, and the higher sum wins)? Or other card games, dice games, electronic games, or other non-stressful ways to work on speed and practice? Bill Yes, we have dino dice and Numbers League. We are having trouble finding things with subtraction though! We also play monoploy jr and are looking into other games like that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brijen97 Posted July 21, 2011 Author Share Posted July 21, 2011 You know, Becca actually does better adding and subtracting 2-3 digit numbers than single digit ones. Thats funny...Maddie just sits there and stares into outer space trying to remember the answer then gets all bent out of joint that she can't remember, its a bad cycle! It doesn't matter what kind of problem we are working on...1 digit, 2 digits. Then when I say something about it to help her remember she gets the answer then gets mad that I helped her! :tongue_smilie: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spy Car Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 Yes, we have dino dice and Numbers League. We are having trouble finding things with subtraction though! We also play monoploy jr and are looking into other games like that. You can also do Subtraction War with cards, dice or dominos. If you are interested in a very good complete Math Game set RightStart makes a very good one. You can sometimes find it here used, and runs about $50 new with a Game Book. Bill Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SilverMoon Posted July 21, 2011 Share Posted July 21, 2011 Another way to get some painless practice in is to have them play XtraMath daily. That website will keep track of the problems they've mastered and continually practice the rest, while taking just a few minutes out of the day. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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