Noble Knights of Knowledge? Miquon?

[Jayne J]

Ok, so here I am again, asking about math curricula. (Is that right? Curricula? Seems like it should be...) Anyways.

Has anyone tried this http://www.livelylessons.com/index.html ? It's the Noble Knights of Knowledge math curriculum/game. Looks interesting, and my son loves knights so it seems like it would be fun. Anyone have any advice?

Next, how about Miquon Math? Love it, hate it? If you used it all the way through to the end, what did you switch to, and how did it work for you?

These are the two front runners for our elem. math, and I'm not sure what to do. Thanks!!

[TracyR]

We gave Miquon a try one year . I like the program and the concept of it . But the Lab Annotations weren't of any help to me . Now they maybe for you . Math is not my strong subject . The concept of the Cuisenaire rods at the time were foreign to me so I had a tough time understanding the use of them in the multiplication and division . But if you are comfortable using the cusienaire rods then this maybe a good math program for you . I have heard if you finish all the way through you can start with Saxon 5/4 or any other 4th grade math program . I ended up using some of it as a supplement for my 2nd daughter and that worked well for me . I switched to BJU math and then Saxon afterwards . For me I just didn't have the confidence to teach it . But I did like it . By the way I have the Lab Annotations and the red, blue and green workbooks for sale if your interested :>)

[FunnyFarmMom]

I have ordered the Noble Knights stuff, but it seems to be a pretty small company and kind of slow, so I haven't gotten all my stuff yet. I'll post back here when I get a chance to look it over. I thought that my fantasy-loving, constantly-dressing-up younger 3 would really like the approach to basic math. We'll see!

[Mallory]

We love Miquon, and I also like the looks of Noble Knights.

 

For K-3 we use Miquon along with lots of other manipulatives, books, and games. Math is something I (and my children) are strong in, so I don't worry about it too much.

 

My oldest is through the yellow book, only has purple left. We are taking the summer, and my third trimester ;), off from school. For next year he will do the purple book and work a little more seriously with some of our manipulatives. Going through the books we have on base 10 blocks, geoboards, and TOPS Get a Grip at least, and probably getting math facts quicker.

 

Compared to the kids down the street, I feel like my kids have a much better grasp on the whole idea of math. When those kids look at Miquon they are completely stumped when the problems are written different, like this ___= 5+7 or 12 = ___-6. They also freeze up when there is a problem with big numbers, even if it is very easy, 4006+ 4002=____. I also really like the way Miquon teaches adding and subtracting large numbers. 578-246 is the same as 578-200-40-6, it's so much easier to start on the left side when you are doing it in your head.

 

I am not sure what we will do for 4th grade, but not any thing too serious. Maybe Key to books and eventually Life of Fred.

[RebeccaC]

I used NKK with my oldest so a few years ago. For us it worked very well for several reasons, one he loved all things middle ages, two it is very visual with some hands on, however the most important reason was the math concepts were given in story form. This same son is also doing very well with Life Of Fred. I wish NKK had taught fractions and decimal and other concepts but it did a very good job of teaching the basic 4 math operations.

 

If you have nay more questions just let me know and I will try and answer or dig out our NKK and see what it says :)

[Ellie]

Here's the thing with Miquon: It is assumed that the children are already familiar with the rods before beginning Miquon, so you need to do something else first. Mathematics Made Meaningful is my favorite. Spend a couple of weeks doing the activity cards, then start Miquon.

 

And then, you're supposed to use the Teacher's Lab Notations lessons to help your dc discover things first, *then* give him the seatwork. Some people want to give the seatwork to the dc and teach them how to do the page, but that's backward. You do the teaching first; the seatwork pages reinforce what you have taught.

 

If you like manipulatives, and working that closely with your dc for possibly extended periods of time, you'll like Miquon. If not, you won't.

 

Many people do report that they supplement Miquon with something like Calculadders to help with learning basic arithmetic facts.

[Jayne J]

Thanks everyone for the feedback. I'm glad to finally find some folks who've heard of Noble Knights, let alone actually tried it!! I've been looking and drooling and wondering for a long time :D

Rebecca--The biggest questions I have are these: How extensive is the content? The site says it can be used for k-4 math, and that seemed to me a bit of a stretch. Is it? And second, how necessary are the knight figures and the optional animals for the second game? Could a little boy with, oh say 50 lbs. of plastic knight toys, and a few animals make do without all the extras?

Ellie--thanks for the heads up on the cuisenaire rods. Frankly, I've never worked with them before either, so it would definately do us good to get familiar first!

[RebeccaC]

I bought the Standard Edition and did not buy any of the extra knights, the jewels are a must tho :) This program teaches the 4 operations of math. The animals are only used at the end of the program to teach prime numbers. We never used them. I used the 100s chart to teach the prime numbers, however if your ds is at the younger end he might need the critters.

 

Just so you know my younger son discovered prime numbers with out ever being taught them along with most of the times tables, etc.... My older son who has a high IQ with true LD issues had trouble with math because it is a language and spoken word is a second language for him. He is highly creative and a visual spatial thinker (vision is his first language) and NKK kit the bill for him when no other math program including; Mathematics Made Meaningful and other Cuisenaire rod products, MUS, Making Math Meaningful by Quinne, Developmental Math, and others. He was on the older end of the age group when we used it.

 

It does not teach things like measurement, money, time, the writing of number as words, ect..... I used Moving with Math for that. Fractions and decimals are also not covered and I used Life of Fred which worked nicely. If you son does well with NKK he will probably do very well with LOF.

 

NKK teaches place value very well and the 4 basic operations of math. It uses a 100s chart to teach number patterns and other math concepts not usually cover in other math programs and as you can see I have owned more than my fair share of them :glare:

 

I sent this out to another mom on the boards today and it might help,

 

The concepts are taught in a story that is usually only about a paragraph long. Problems are given in a story that is usually only a sentence long. NKK is a mastery program however it is not mastery of all of the operation at once. Addition is first, taught as pairs with jewels, 1 to 20. As in what makes 6; 0 & 6, 1 & 6, 2 & 4, and 3 & 3.

 

The second chapter is on place value, number reading, 100 chart and patterns found using a 100 chart (no multiplication patterns on the 100s chart are taught at this stage,) and grouping. The next two chapters build on the the grouping taught in chapter two.

 

Subtraction is not taught until chapter 5. Concepts need for the subtraction chapter are;

• 
   
  
• Basics skills needed for starting NKK
  
• An understanding of basic grouping in tens, and the simple rule.
  
• Basic addition.

 

 

If the above skills are not mastered then the chapter should not be started. Chapter 1 does not need to be mastered until chapter 5 which is the subtraction chapter. So the child can be learning number pairs while working on chapters 2, 3, and 4.

 

All the operations are introduced at the lowest level, mastery at that level is expected and then taught at a higher level several chapters later. If a chapter is on addition all work in that chapter will be addition, if the chapter is on division all problems will be on division.

 

Hope this was helpful and answers your questions. If not just let me know.

[Starr]

We used Miquon Math for 2 + years with each child. It worked very well for us. My dc still talk about the good old math days. My ds started Scott Foresman in 3rd grade (he liked the colorful workbook) but still used the cuisenaire rods and my dd in 4th. She was then able to go into Jacobs Algebra in 7th grade,split into 2 years, with a review of basic math in the middle. Have fun.

[Ravin]

I like the look of NKK, it's right up our alley as an SCA family. I'm planning on using Miquon, but I might just order NKK too and use them together, because DD likes variety and we like games of all sorts.

 

I think she may be ready for a math program sooner than I was originally thinking...today she sat there for five minutes discussing addition/multiplication by two's with her fingers. Probably time to get her thinking about some manipulatives beyond those!

[Isa]

I have really enjoyed Miquon, and so have my children. That being said, I haven't used it strictly the way it was intended. My approach has been to let my children pick which page they would like to do each day (they do need to follow a sequence within each topic). I do help and explain things more if they're starting out (in the Orange book). If they have any questions they come and ask, but otherwise they figure it out on their own. In this way it becomes an interesting puzzle for them.

 

My children and I have also liked the abacus manipulative better than the cuisenaire rods, so unless a page specifically calls for cuisenaire rods, the abacus is used instead.

 

In addition to Miquon, I do supplement to make sure that my children really understand what they're learning. I use Professor B Math, fluency instruction, and math games.

 

When my children finish Miquon, they transition right into Singapore 4A.

[Mommy22alyns]

We're using Singapore 1A with Miquon Orange right now. I'd never used the Cuisenaire rods before either, but we spent some free time playing with them. The rod track has been very helpful in reminding us which number the black rod represents, etc.

 

I've kind of been doing Miquon "wrong" too, starting out. But Becca is enjoying working with the rods and picks up concepts faster with them. She's quickly finding creative ways to get to different numbers after only a few lessons.

[Reya]

Noble Knights--I had a friend who did it. Her DS loved the stories, but the quality of the math teaching was....meh. It just conceptually wasn't there. Now she's doing RightStart and hasn't looked back! EDIT: The stories also gave the program a LOT of overhead.

 

Miquon--Solid conceptually, but I don't like the organization or the Cuisinaire rods (you can't tell the length at a glance but must memorize which color means which number). Also, it was very unwieldy to try to accelerate. The Annotations are critical to a meaningful usage of the program.

[Rosie_0801]

Here's the thing with Miquon: It is assumed that the children are already familiar with the rods before beginning Miquon, so you need to do something else first. Mathematics Made Meaningful is my favorite. Spend a couple of weeks doing the activity cards, then start Miquon.

 

Are these activity cards part of the K program? I looked at the website but couldn't figure it out.

Rosie

[Jayne J]

Thanks thanks thanks for all the replies! RebeccaC thanks for the in-depth info on Noble Knights, it's really helping me figure out what I want to do! It sounds like alot of people are saying that both NKK and Miquon need some supplementing. I'm thinking that the combo of both might be best.

The cuisenaire rod issue is still causing me some hesitation--any more input on how hard they are to learn to work with? (I'm REALLY not a math person, can you tell?:001_smile:)

[RebeccaC]

Thanks thanks thanks for all the replies! RebeccaC thanks for the in-depth info on Noble Knights, it's really helping me figure out what I want to do! It sounds like a lot of people are saying that both NKK and Miquon need some supplementing. I'm thinking that the combo of both might be best.

The cuisenaire rod issue is still causing me some hesitation--any more input on how hard they are to learn to work with? (I'm REALLY not a math person, can you tell?:001_smile:)

 

We found them not only hard to learn but hard to handle due to fine motor delays in my boys. We prefer the MUS blocks and then base 10 blocks since they are both marked/ measured off.

 

The cuisenaire rods add another layer to what had to be learned, pair a color to a number, with out markers on the rod. Red equals two and light green equals 3 but dark green equals 6, ect..... The cuisenaire rods are also the smallest and the unit/ones blocks are pretty tiny.

 

The MUS (Math-U-See) rods are colored but they are also measured off not so with the cuisenaire rods and because they are measured off the stack without sliding off. So you can take the 5 rod and build the 2 and 3 rods on top of the five. The 5 rod will have 5 raised squares on it and the 3 rod will have 3 raised squares on it.

 

The Base ten blocks are all wood tone or all the same solid color and measured off, so the 10 rod will have 10 squares not raised and so they do not build like the MUS blocks do.

 

This of course was just our experience I am sure that not every one had the same problems we had with them.

 

HTH,

Rebecca

[Closeacademy]

On the rods used for Miquon you are not supposed to associate the rods with a specific number as they are used in different ways for different parts of the program. They are just a tool not a static manipulative.:001_smile:

[Mallory]

I agree with Closeacadamy, the great thing about the rods is that they aren't a specific number.

 

So if the rod that is 5 cm long is your "1," then the orange rod is "2" and the white rod is 1/5. You can see how they are related to each other, not how they always relate to the white rod=1. I thought the ways to change "1" were especially helpful for fractions. In most fraction sets, the whole or 1 is the same size just split into more pieces. With the rods we could see that a fifth of this size bar is more or less then a fifth of this size bar, even though they are both fifths.

 

While the boys had the rods to play around with for a few days, we didn't much prep work. We also rarely use the rods at all, only for some tricky new concept, but again that may just be because the boys are strong in math.

[Jayne J]

So if the rod that is 5 cm long is your "1," then the orange rod is "2" and the white rod is 1/5. You can see how they are related to each other, not how they always relate to the white rod=1. I thought the ways to change "1" were especially helpful for fractions. In most fraction sets, the whole or 1 is the same size just split into more pieces. With the rods we could see that a fifth of this size bar is more or less then a fifth of this size bar, even though they are both fifths.

 

Ahhh. Gotcha. Its a visual relationship type tool. Ok, that makes sense. Thanks!

[Mallory]

If the rods are too small for you children to use very well, then they just won't work. But we appreciate that they are based on centimeters.

 

So the white cube is 1 centemeter cubed, which is also the same volume as a milliliter, or an orange rod is the same length as a decimeter, or 10 together are a meter. We also have a Base 10 set that does have the scoring, but is also based on centimeters, so the 1000 cube is the same volume as a liter. Being typical Americans with only a fuzzy understanding of the metric system, it is nice when we see those measurements somewhere else we can visualize how much 3 milliliters is.