BlueTaelon Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 I'm at a loss, we've taken a couple months off from school due to current circumstances but I'm ready to get back into school. I didn't "get" fractions until recently. dd did know how to do them but then TT brought in this whole factoring thing and its causing dd to hate math, me to for that matter and now she can't seem to gasp fractions because its wanting her to factor. Should I allow her to just skip the factoring stuff and move on? I know its supposed to make working a problem go faster but all it does it leave us in a tizzy. I'd rather just work with large numbers and reduce them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chrysalis Academy Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 Maybe pick up the book Math Doesn't Suck by Danica McKellar? It has really wonderful explanations - in words - about factoring and fractions. There are also free video teaching options, like Khan Academy or AoPS videos. If we're having a hard time with a concept, I will often try to find alternative explanations that dd can engage with directly. TT is sometimes light on explaining the why behind things - it shows you how to do it, but doesn't really explain it. Maybe that leap is troubling her? Anyway, I have no idea if this is true for your dd, but my dd can't "learn" something she doesn't understand the why of. So rather than having her do more and more problems on a topic that she doesn't get, and frustrates her, I'd look for an explanation that makes sense to her (and to you). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Random Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 My son had a lot of trouble understanding fractions/factoring, and I bought him the Key To Fractions series. I'm not sure if it was just seeing a different explanation or if the Key To...series really helped, but it worked! It begins with the most basic, simple, plain and clear explanation of what a fraction is, and eventually moves into more complex operations. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmoira Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 Should I allow her to just skip the factoring stuff and move on? I know its supposed to make working a problem go faster but all it does it leave us in a tizzy. I'd rather just work with large numbers and reduce them. I wouldn't, because understanding how numbers work is essential to success in higher math. I'm not familiar with TT, so I don't know if the unit is about factoring generally, or about prime factoring. Sometimes it is helpful to express numbers as multiples of their smallest parts. This is what prime factoring does. It's kind of like chemistry, with prime factors being the individual atoms. Some molecules have one oxygen atom, some two, and you always list them all when describing the molecule. There is one and only one way to prime factor, that's why it's helpful when working with fractions. There is only one way to express 36 using prime numbers: 36 = 2x2x3x3. One trick: you don't have to check for prime factors greater than whole number portion of the square root of the number: 150 is just more than 12x12=144, so there won't be any factors pairs with both numbers greater than 12 (i.e. only 2, 3, 5, 7, 11 must be checked). This makes sense when you think of the final list of factors and how they meet at or near the middle. Factors of 36 1, 36 2, 18 3, 12 4, 9 6, 6 What specific problem is she having? ETA: clarified "trick" above, was imprecise and muddled. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dana Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 Agreeing with nmoira. Also, prime factorization of a number is very helpful with simplifying radicals. Prime factorization of a number is unique is so important a concept, it's the Fundamental Theorem of Arithmetic. I wouldn't skip it :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueTaelon Posted January 11, 2013 Author Share Posted January 11, 2013 Maybe pick up the book Math Doesn't Suck by Danica McKellar? It has really wonderful explanations - in words - about factoring and fractions. There are also free video teaching options, like Khan Academy or AoPS videos. If we're having a hard time with a concept, I will often try to find alternative explanations that dd can engage with directly. TT is sometimes light on explaining the why behind things - it shows you how to do it, but doesn't really explain it. Maybe that leap is troubling her? Anyway, I have no idea if this is true for your dd, but my dd can't "learn" something she doesn't understand the why of. So rather than having her do more and more problems on a topic that she doesn't get, and frustrates her, I'd look for an explanation that makes sense to her (and to you). She gets pretty much nothing out of auditory instruction so both the Khan and AoPS videos left her lost, doesn't help that we will not have internet in another week or 2 and I'm scrambling to find offline stuff to take the place of the highly visual online stuff we use. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
myfunnybunch Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 What about something like this site? Visual Fractions ETA: Hit "Post" too soon. When my son struggled with fractions, I made/found around the house some manipulatives, but it took time. This looks like it might be helpful for a more visual learner without having to make a bunch of stuff. Cat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fairfarmhand Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 she will need the factoring. It's used frequently in math. Have you looked at Life of Fred Fractions? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nmoira Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 Have you looked at Life of Fred Fractions? It's not going to help with factoring. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chrysalis Academy Posted January 11, 2013 Share Posted January 11, 2013 She gets pretty much nothing out of auditory instruction so both the Khan and AoPS videos left her lost, doesn't help that we will not have internet in another week or 2 and I'm scrambling to find offline stuff to take the place of the highly visual online stuff we use. Ok. I really, really would try putting Math Doesn't Suck on hold at your library. The way things are explained just clicked a lot of things with dd10. It might work for your dd too. Good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BlueTaelon Posted January 12, 2013 Author Share Posted January 12, 2013 Ok. I really, really would try putting Math Doesn't Suck on hold at your library. The way things are explained just clicked a lot of things with dd10. It might work for your dd too. Good luck. I ordered a copy off Amazon, should be here in a couple of days, thanks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TKDmom Posted January 12, 2013 Share Posted January 12, 2013 We've been working through MEP 4B and it does factoring over, and over, and over again. Right now, each day of dd's lesson starts out having her factorize 4 or 5 number. Factoring a few numbers each day has been great for helping dd gain an intuitive sense of what prime factors a number should have. She's much better at it than she was a few months ago. MEP is way too much to use as a supplement, but it might help to look at how they teach it. It looks like it first shows up on the first page of lesson 51 in MEP 4A here. My first introduction to the way MEP does factorizing was a review in Lesson 89 (Page 28 of this document. It shows up again on p. 81, then becomes daily drill from Lesson 117 on). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
almondbutterandjelly Posted January 13, 2013 Share Posted January 13, 2013 We used the "Watch These Factor Trees Grow" poster from this set of pre-algebra posters: http://www.ebay.com/itm/PRE-ALGEBRA-Pre-algebra-Algebra-Math-Bulletin-Board-Set-NEW-/360481832488 (this isn't my listing. It's just the only picture I could find of them. I got mine from one of our local teacher stores, The Learning Zone or Mardel). Then I cut out a bunch of trees from cute scrapbook paper and we added the "ornaments" accordingly. My visual learner loves factoring! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AngelBee Posted January 23, 2013 Share Posted January 23, 2013 Taking notes as my ds13 is also having trouble. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Violet Crown Posted January 23, 2013 Share Posted January 23, 2013 This may be way out there as a suggestion, but dh taught the girls fractions early on as slope. The portable graphing whiteboards sold by Rainbow Resource are useful for this. Somehow, seeing that (2,1), (4,2), (-4,-2), etc. were all on the same line made a lot of what they were learning in Key To Fractions make a lot of sense. We also followed the iron rule in our arithmetic work of writing (rewriting if necessary) all division problems as fractions, so that they internalized the fraction bar as meaning "divided by." YMMV. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alessandra Posted January 24, 2013 Share Posted January 24, 2013 Although I have a ds who learned with no trouble. my dd just got stuck on basic fractions this week, so I can empathize. No spefic recommendations, as we are behind where you are. But what worked for us (YMMV) was stepping back and taking it really slowly. Really, really slowly, like one page, when we usually do 8-10 pages. I sat with dd, we used manipulatives together. Mostly I made sure to be utterly explicit with every step. Even when dd knew the answer, we went over every step. Lots of reassurance and praise. Lots of saying how important it is to understand and that we will spend as much time as she needs. (I confess to criticising previous ps for jumping ahead too fast, blaming it all on them...). In any case, dd cheered up today, began to understand (think of the proverbial light bulb going on) and can hardly wait until tomorrow. But, no, I would not skip an important part of math. Maybe a day off before you begin again, but skipping could imply that you think it might be too hard for your dd. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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