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I am the mother of seven children ranging in ages from 21 to 2. I have homeschooled for about 8 years. I say this to clarify my experience.

 

I am concerned about my almost 8yod. She is terrible at math. She is working at the end of a 2nd grade math book right now and just tested at the beginning of 2nd. During our short break between "years" (April of this year) we did timed tests every day to keep up the addition and subtraction skills. No matter if she was timed or not timed she could not get them all correct. (These were 5-minute timed tests of 100 problems.) Now that we are schooling again, I'm trying to introduce subtraction and addition of two or three digit numbers (276 + 23 or 199 + 210 or 412 - 89, etc). She gets them wrong every time unless I say "and now what, and what's next", etc. She knows the STEPS of what she is supposed to do, but she just can't get the facts right. She'll start at the ones and add when she is supposed to subtract, then she'll carry the group of ten and subtract in the tens row. Every problem she finds a different way to do wrong. I've stopped moving forward in the curriculum (MCP) in order to just practice, practice, practice. Another problem: a couple weeks ago she was getting them right and now she can't figure out how to do them again. Is this "average student" learning a new skill, "slow student" learning slowly or "learning disordered student" who needs some kind of help? I try to use manipulatives (blocks, number line, word problems, cuisinaire) to give her as much variety and approaches as possible. Yesterday she wrote that 9-5=14 and she just couldn't figure out why it was wrong. :confused:

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OK, keep in mind that I am NOT a math expert...but this almost exactly describes my son at the same age (he's 9 now).

 

Here's an example of what he would do.

 

The problem 45+25 would be on his paper. He would say, "12" and write the answer (which was extremely wrong at ANOTHER problem). He really had no clue. No clue at all what he was doing. He would do stuff like this all the time. He would also completely forget how to subtract...how to regroup...etc. I was tearing my hair out. I probably taught him place value 1600 times.

 

He started off using Horizons...then we tried CLE....then we tried Singapore... Eventually, I started him over COMPLETELY with Miquon. OK, so here's what helped him:

 

He needed more white space on each page -this was a recurring problem for him

Miquon + C-rods (I think Miquon saved his math's life - Lol)

5 review problems on dry erase board every day

Living math books - here's some ideas www.livingmath.net

A base 10 block set

 

just informal math like this: www.educationunboxed.com I love this website and have been using this with him, also.

 

He actually made huge strides last year with all that - especially with the math play and living math books.

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My 8yo dd is still in the first half of Saxon 2. She is still just doing single digit addition. So your 8yo is working ahead of her! :) I think D would cry if I had her do a test of 100 problems. She was crying & calling hereelf bad at math when we did Math Mammoth (and before that, Right Start) before we switched to Saxon. I'm currently not worried about the slower pace/easier math she's working on. So, from my perspective, your dd is in the range of normal.

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I really think it sounds pretty normal--she did test into grade 2. It could be that the curriculum isn't teaching what was needed for that test. Neither of you are enjoying math much right now. Maybe a change of pace is in order. Could she work on something else for the summer? Maybe some workbooks from the dollar store. Something that looks different and after a couple of weeks maybe even starts that addition all over again? For my dc's a change of pace really helped. Just slip them in " for summer" and see what happens.

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My hubby is a math professor and has done some work with slds in the past. He says he is NOT an expert, but it sounds like your dd is outside the norm for her age. He mentioned dyscalculia- a learning disability specific to math. It may be something to look into. http://www.ncld.org/ld-basics/ld-aamp-language/ld-aamp-math/what-is-dyscalculia

 

hth and good luck!

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That sounds just like what my math strugglers do. They are 8 and I really think they have dyscalculia. I find they do better orally, and with c-rods, an abacus, and base 10 blocks for everything. I hate it because I wonder if they really know what is going on or if they just pick up on my subtle clues as to what the right answer is when we do it orally. I'm going to hire a tutor to help them solidify basic number concepts like place value and counting. They also do dreambox which has helped a lot and is something that takes the pressure off of me.

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My eldest also had me tearing out my hair for almost a year with math. She needed me there for every. single. step. Otherwise she'd stare off into space, twirl her hair, flip her pencil off the table, etc. She'd also forget how to do things she'd been doing for months. Here's what worked for her:

 

(1) No breaks from math. The longest she goes without doing some kind of math problems is over the weekend. And even then we might be doing LOF as storytime in the evenings. So even on vacations, there has to be some type of review. And forget summers off, we school year round. I was so frustrated each time we'd come back from a break and she'd forget things, we put an end to that.

 

(2) Fewer problems. I don't even want to imagine the daily drama/battles that would arise if I assigned her 100 problems each day. She does her SM exercise each day followed by a line in each of her review books. That is, she has 1 review/drill book each for addition/subtraction/multiplication/division and she must do 1 line daily in each. In total, that's probably about 30 review problems altogether. This is basically a continuation of (1) in that her SM lessons may be focusing on division for a week or two but I want to keep the other functions fresh in her mind in the meantime.

 

(3) No time tests. We used to do timed drills with XtraMath and the like, but the only progress she made was in her tear production. It just wasn't worth it. I feel that being able to complete her math lessons above in a timely manner is more important at this point.

 

(4) The passage of time. I don't know if it was the changes made above or simply maturation on her part (or a combination thereof), but math usually doesn't produce the waterworks that it used to. She definitely doesn't consider herself a math fan (which is really too bad, because she's excellent at it for her age), but it's no longer a familial struggle.

 

GL, I wish you the best :)

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My eldest also had me tearing out my hair for almost a year with math. She needed me there for every. single. step. Otherwise she'd stare off into space, twirl her hair, flip her pencil off the table, etc. She'd also forget how to do things she'd been doing for months.

 

Oh my gosh...are we sharing kids? I put piggy tails into DD's hair, to keep her walrus bangs (*sigh*) from falling into her eyes...and those blasted piggie braids are MORE distracting to her than anything else!

 

To the PP...to me, it sounds like your DD *may* have dyscalculia or possibly a vision-related issue. I'm not math expert, but what you described is similar to what I've been hearing from some of the parents on our dyslexia yahoo group.

 

Does she struggle anywhere else with schooling?

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My hubby is a math professor and has done some work with slds in the past. He says he is NOT an expert, but it sounds like your dd is outside the norm for her age. He mentioned dyscalculia- a learning disability specific to math. It may be something to look into. http://www.ncld.org/ld-basics/ld-aamp-language/ld-aamp-math/what-is-dyscalculia

 

hth and good luck!

:iagree:Dyscalculia was what I was thinking too, although I am no expert, it just is very reminiscent of the kids I worked with at our primary ps.

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You have a lot more experience with children than I do, so I'm just going to throw this out there as food for thought. My girls started having body odor at 8yo and started showing other signs of pre-puberty at nine. It seemed to also affect their ability to think. Some days they did their work perfectly and other days it seemed that everything they had ever learned had fallen out of their heads ;).

 

For comparison - my youngest is 10 and is just now doing the type of math your 8yo is doing. When my dd was 8yo she knew very few math facts. She has made amazing progress in the past six months. :) Time has made a big difference here.

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It's definitely worth investigating dyscalculia.

 

A couple of other ideas... try what sounds good & ignore rest...

 

I like base 10 blocks over most manipulatives for basic arithmetic. When getting started, REQUIRE the child to show the problem with the manipulatives and THEN write the answer. With 14-5, have 14 blocks and have them take 5 away, count the remainder, then write the answer. It WILL be frustratingly slow at first, but with time and practice, speed will come (unless there's some other issue).

 

Don't do a large worksheet. Go based on time. Maybe 30 min and when done, stop. You don't want to have rehearsal of incorrect procedures or starting with wild guesses.

 

The base 10 blocks do a good job of showing place value and why the traditional algorithms are what we use.

For 276 + 48 (changing problem for carrying): have her set up 2 hundreds, 7 tens, 6 ones at one location, then 4 tens and 8 ones in another location. Then put them together. Discuss the need for regrouping and why you'd start with the ones first. Work the problem with the blocks to get the answer & write it down. Then rework the problem with the blocks while writing each step with the standard algorithm. Get addition pretty solid before doing subtraction.

 

It may take a week of only doing addition problems (and maybe only managing 10 problems in a half hour) before you can move on to subtraction.

 

We did this when my son was learning the division algorithm. It was frustrating to me to take a day and only get 3 problems done with the blocks, but he did get the hang of it & using the blocks did give a much better understanding of what the algorithm is doing and why.

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