Day 28 - Math

We are working on math with the boys, kind of in a loosey goosey way until my Singapore Math workbooks and textbook get here (and I need to order the home instructors guide). I was really surprised that my boys did not immediately take to math manipulatives (i.e. counting with beans, rods, etc.), in fact they seemed annoyed by them. I was at a lose about what to do, so I have just been writing out the 1+ tables, and the 2+ tables, and so on and having them work on problems (really boring). Then, I came upon this really cool website called the Khan Academy. It is a series of videos on YouTube that teach math from basic addition on up. The boys watched it and were fascinated by the "yard stick" method in which you have a series of numbers written along a horizontal line. You mark the first number in the equation and then make little jumps equivalent to the second number in the equation to get the answer. Example: 2 + 5 = you would mark the #2 and then with your pencil jump 5 spots to land on the 7. I thought I would switch it up and make a game-type board. I want to get some little pieces (like from Monopoly but bigger so L won't eat them and choke)...maybe have one piece as the primary spot marker and then have a car or something that "drives" the number of spaces needed.


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My Singapore books came last night, but I am still going to use this when we do problems.