How do you help kids improve math facts accuracy?

[Guest]

My 10 year old son is nearing the end of Mathusee Pre-algebra - it has been very easy for him, except he is careless with his math facts. He understands a concept perfectly, but does the multiplication wrong. He doesn't have a problem with multiplication when he's focused and he's fast with his facts, but with longer problems he makes silly mistakes.

 

I've been requiring him to go back and correct the missed problems and he hates this. Occasionally I tell him he can skip the extra practice pages if he gets the first page correct and this helps sometimes, but I'm afraid it also creates an unnecessary expectation of perfection for him. He hates getting problems wrong, but this attitude doesn't help him slow down and be more careful in his work. I want him to understand it's ok to make mistakes but that he should try his best. 

 

What would you do? "Torture" him by making him do all the problems or allow him to be sloppy and cruise through with less practice? He wants to do everything fast - finish schoolwork quickly, play his violin as fast as possible, etc. This kid doesn't like to slow down!

 

Thanks :)

Sarah

[Annie Elle]

I have the same problem with my daughter.

 

xtramath.org worked wonders in helping my kids nail down their math facts. It's interactive, fun and done on the computer.

 

And it is free.

[brownie]

Flashcards...forwards and backwards.  And by backwards I mean that I give just an answer...like 24.  I will put 3 dots in the corner to indicate there are 3 facts that make 24.  He needs to name all 3 ways.

 

I never had a problem until my youngest came along, and actually he didn't have a huge issue learning them forwards.  But then I realized most of math after that point requires you to be able to do them backwards better than forwards...division, reducing fractions, factoring, etc...

 

It never occurred to me bc I never had a kid who didn't find backwards just as easy as forwards.  But my youngest is super visual spatial - don't know if that has anything to do with it.  Anyhow, now we drill backwards.  For forwards I just printed worksheets off for timed quizes.

[Kerileanne99]

Have you seen the game/challenge Sixty-second sweep?

Here is a YouTube clip of it, including a link for the printable honeycomb of products. The idea is that you do the multiplication facts backwards...so you name the factors basically, and you try to get all the way through in 60 seconds or less:)

My kiddo memorized multiplication tables as a suprise Xmas present for daddy last year with the visual stories from multiplication.com, so this was the next step to make sure they were cemented. Doing them this way was amazing in that she mastered simple division at the same time.

I know your child is way past that, but this is such a fun method/challenge tht he may take to it. There is a 'competition' of sorts for kids to take the challenge, make their own video, that kind of thing.

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=SAmf1hhv8tQ

[IsabelC]

Thanks for the backwards drill suggestion. I suspect that might be exactly what my son needs, because he somehow recalls multiplication without recalling division (eg today he started having a meltdown because he didn't know factors for 54, even though if you ask him 9x6 he says 54, and he does understand division conceptually as multiplication in reverse). 

 

[kroe1]

Carelessness with math facts is common at that age. We always made our kiddos redo the problem. Sometimes we would use examples of math fact errors causing huge problems, I.e. Medication errors, bridge collapses, Lego design malfunctions. We did not harp on these things, but did mention these things a time or two to show why math must be perfect. Finally, A Beka had those crazy speed drill worksheets. I always thought those things were torture devices for kiddos until I realized the benefits in later years. So any way to learn the skill of quick, mental arithmetic is probably a good thing.

[ebunny]

My 10 year old son is nearing the end of Mathusee Pre-algebra - it has been very easy for him, except he is careless with his math facts. He understands a concept perfectly, but does the multiplication wrong. He doesn't have a problem with multiplication when he's focused and he's fast with his facts, but with longer problems he makes silly mistakes.

 

I've been requiring him to go back and correct the missed problems and he hates this. Occasionally I tell him he can skip the extra practice pages if he gets the first page correct and this helps sometimes, but I'm afraid it also creates an unnecessary expectation of perfection for him. He hates getting problems wrong, but this attitude doesn't help him slow down and be more careful in his work. I want him to understand it's ok to make mistakes but that he should try his best. 

 

What would you do? "Torture" him by making him do all the problems or allow him to be sloppy and cruise through with less practice? He wants to do everything fast - finish schoolwork quickly, play his violin as fast as possible, etc. This kid doesn't like to slow down!

 

Thanks :)

Sarah

 

 

Firstly, IMHO, the idea of 'practice' has to be understood in its entirety. It is not 'drill and kill'. It is about doing something often enough and long enough for it to become an automatic habit. It isn't torture (although our children sometimes  like to believe so :) )..its a necessity.

 

It is necessary because without getting facts automatic, he might find Algebra uphill. I know some children do go on to Algebra without automaticity of Arithmetic facts, but, speaking for myself, I will insist on my DD become fluent on arithmetic computation before heading towards abstract math.(I used to think otherwise earlier, but my own experience and my DD's has made me acknowledge the value of automaticity through regular practice)

 

I am careful to explain to my DD why she needs to practice and why I insist on it because if she catches that I am indecisive or ambiguous about the need for 'practice'...she will negotiate her way out of it. :D

 

So, in short, I will go with the first choice- make him do most of the problems (maybe 5-6 instead of 10?) and give him extra problems the next day if and when he makes errors ( If accuracy is less than 80%)

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Tanikit]

I do not ever allow my 6 year old to be sloppy when she writes a sum and since it is being drummed into her at this age as long as I make sure I keep checking I do not think she will be at 12 - she knows that sloppy work means errors and means redoing the sum - even Life of Fred's rows of practice where if you get one wrong you redo the row has helped with this.

 

Everyone wants to be finished fast - but then it must be acceptable - legible, correctly done - else it will NOT be done fast - it will be redone. This is one of the easiest lessons to teach since the consequence of having to redo it is immediate and the reward of getting it done faster if neater is also immediate - they learn very very fast - much faster than teaching other things.

[Dmmetler]

In our case, we just had to find the right motivation. For my DD, that happened when she did her first World math games and discovered that she was so much slower than the top competitors. Accurate, but slow. We subscribed to Mathletics (which is basically just 1 minute speed drills of various combinations (there are the gold bar lessons as well), and she set her goal to get to "Human calculator" in all categories. She hasn't made it yet (in part because she's also doing the gold bars, and every time her level goes up there, the levels for the live rounds also adjust the expectations), but she's gotten much faster. Next year is another World games, so she's hoping to actually be able to get on the high score table for math (she's managed it for the other 2 categories, but not for math).

 

 

[raptor_dad]

For my DS7... he doesn't like doing practice multiplication problems at all, and division even less... However, he quite enjoys building factor trees for numbers and building factor houses a la Miquon ( simple lists of all the pairs of factors of a number). This is similar to the backwards practice mentioned above... I speculate the forward problems feel like work and the backwards problems feel like puzzles. Either way the key is to do enough problems that it becomes automatic so finding a context that works is the key.

[ThatHomeschoolDad]

IXL.com is worth the yearly subscription.

[Guest]

Thank you, all, for the great suggestions. I don't think it's a question of not knowing the facts, just sloppiness, but maybe I'm wrong and if we do more practice, he will get faster (a huge plus for him) and more accurate. My kids always complain when I give them something new, but often they end up liking it, so maybe this kind of practice will be helpful. 

[Crimson Wife]

It's a maturity thing IMHO.

[Guest]

I just discovered HSBC has a discount on IXL that's ending today! https://www.homeschoolbuyersco-op.org/ixl-math/ I think I'm going to subscribe. It looks like a great resource. 

[lewelma]

Neither of my sons can do a full page of just straight practice, it is just too boring. And boring leads to sloppy work IMHO. I found that if I gave them harder problems (really tough multi-step word problems) that their accuracy increased dramatically.  Even when my younger needs to drill fraction addition or negative numbers etc, I only have him do 4 in a sitting.  We just spread a set of 20 out over 5 days and keep working through the more interesting conceptual work or word problems.  (He is using Singapore Discovering Maths 7th grade)

 

MUS is not for every kid.  I have not used it but have seen it, and I can tell you that there is no way that either of my kids could ever have gotten through the program.  This is just too much drill.

 

Ruth in NZ

[Guest]

Thanks, Ruth. I think he would be very happy if I sat with him while he did his math. I know he's understanding the concepts - he usually gets them immediately, so I've always been torn about requiring extra practice. I'm constantly learning how to balance 4 kids during the school day. 

[boscopup]

I have two math strands. I have one strand that is "easy" (a couple grade levels below current working level), which includes 1 minute speed drills and spiral practice of elementary techniques. We're using CLE 500 for this. The speed drill and lesson are completely done in 10-15 minutes per day, easy peasy. The other strand is his working level - AoPS Prealgebra. He spends 30-45 minutes on that each day. In the beginning, I told him that if he

 

With this combination, I've seen drastically reduced silly errors in my son. Likewise, my 7 year old has two math strands, and he also no longer makes silly errors. The math facts have become automatic (his CLE lessons include 2 minute speed drills and flashcard usage, but now I'm starting to drop the flash cards for addition/subtraction).

 

I used to agree with the folks saying just give harder math, but I've changed my tune. I'm seeing how giving boring, easy math is helpful for automaticity and developing work ethic. When they go off to a job, they're not going to get to do the "fun stuff" 100% of the time. They need to be capable of doing the boring drudgery type stuff correctly also. As a software developer pre-kids, I loved to write code. Guess what? Much of my job included anything but writing code. That's the way of software development. Often, you'll spend weeks writing requirements, design documents, or documentation. The actual coding and debugging part has very little time allotted to it. That was the fun part, but I got to do it maybe 15% of the time. I needed to do the boring requirements/design/documentation correctly though. My boss wasn't going to accept that it was boring, so I was going to make silly errors. :tongue_smilie:

 

And yes, age/maturity will also factor in, but I have found that extra practice in boring, repetitive things has greatly reduced the errors even without age/maturity happening yet. ;) I don't make them spend an hour on boring stuff, but 10-15 minutes a day doing "easy math" is not a big deal. I told my 9 year old that if it was easy, he could do it quickly. He took that to heart. :)

 

[EndOfOrdinary]

We do not require perfection (it is a serious problem in our household with a perfectionist child).  Like you said, it is unrealistic.  What we require is 85 percent.  If he cannot pass with 85 percent, then it is very much verging into the so-fast-I-am-not-really-engaged mode.  If he doesn't get 85 percent, he has to redo them all.  I don't tell him which one he missed, only that he needs to redo the problems.  Since it is by percent, then he can chose the number of problems he wants to do.  If he does only 4, he cannot miss any.  If he does 10, he can miss one.  If he chooses 20, he can miss 3. 

 

By making it his choice, it has allowed a level of personal motivation.  He used to always pick 4 thinking it would be so fast.  When he missed one and had to redo all of them it wasn't quite as fast.  The laser focus has to come out with only 4 problems.  Normally he picks 10 or 15 problems.  This way he has to focus, but he can make a computational mistake somewhere along the line and be fine.

[bakpak]

I dunno....I always got the concepts fine, but never made 100s in school because of small math mistakes. It was annoying, but not annoying enough to make me scrutinize every single problem over and over again before I handed in a test (I'd look over it, but certainly not redo every single problem). I'm personally glad because I have perfectionist tendencies anyway, and didn't need to go further down that road. In my case I think it's how I see the world. I'm capable of doing fine detail just fine, but prefer the big picture. If I understood the material then that was what was important to me across all subjects. This is still largely the case for me as an adult, and that's the level of work I prefer to do.  So, I personally wouldn't worry about it if it's a minor issue. If it results in half the problems wrong, that's an issue. If it's a couple of typos/easy math mistakes per test/page, then I wouldn't worry about it. Perhaps it's due to other factors as well (distraction, feeling tired, hungry, etc).

 

 

[serendipitous journey]

We also drill, and sometimes run two full tracks (a bit like boscopup) but aren't right now.  I use Calculadder for drill, and SM's Math Sprints also.  I also do oral drills sometimes; I do the 1-15 facts for multiplication and addition one day, division and subtraction the next.  As A. regains fluency we adapt the drills so that they include multiples of 10/decimals, bigger numbers, negatives, &c.  We play this by ear and do what seems most useful that week. 

[acurtis75]

When we were drilling facts we used iPad games....even for multi-digit multiplication and division. DD is sick and asleep right now so I'm not sure the names of all the apps but I think one was math bingo.

 

We are also almost finished with MUS pre-algebra. I wouldn't make a child who understands the concept do more worksheets. I would however make him correct all mistakes. There is actually a lot of learning that goes on when child has to redo problems because they made mistakes. As you move in to higher level math (AOPs especially) attempting and failing problems is a big part of the learning process. I don't think this is an expectation of perfection. I think the 85% correct before moving on is fine but being able to find mistakes is an important skill. At this point I circle problems dd needs to fix but don't point out the errors.

 

We watch dvd, do practice worksheet A and if she demonstrates understanding of the concept move on to the test (which allows for systematic review of previous concepts). Whether it is the worksheet or test I circle anything wrong and she does the problem again to find her mistake. Part of my motivation for doing this is to teach her that checking work is good, making mistakes is okay and sometimes we have to work a problem more than once to get the right answer. In MUS most mistakes she makes are careless errors but sometimes on the hard/challenge beast academy problems she has to come up with a new approach to get the right answer and it wasn't a calculation error. I'm sure this will happen in AOPs when we start in a few weeks. If she hadn't become comfortable with making corrections and having to work problems again I don't think she would be ready for harder math.

 

During long division I discovered that the more boring worksheets we did the more mistakes she made. We've since adjusted our approach and she makes fewer careless or sloppy mistakes.

 

This is a little off topic but I think this approach helped when she did Math Kangaroo recently because she worked all the problems and then went back and checked every answer and found a few mistakes when she was checking. She doesn't do this on her everyday math and I didn't tell her to do it. She just decided it was a good idea. This is from a kid who a year ago would have raced through to be finished 1st and told me checking wasn't necessary because she probably got them all right. She is always shocked when something is wrong. She did still try to finish first...but after she checked everything.