How Do You Teach Maths?

Monday 10th February 2014

How do you feel about maths? How do you teach maths? Do you use a bought set curriculum or do you make it up as you go along?

We are still fairly new to the world of home education, so are still testing things to see what works. We have used a mixture of online websites like study ladder, board games like monopoly/ yahtzee/ card games, work books you can buy from local stationary shops or book shops. But the one thing we have found is that too much of either of them, she gets bored of and before we know it the arguments and resistance has started.

So now we do a mixture of everything, depending on what everyone feels in the mood for :)

                                      

I have done a lot of work with her in the past with addition and subtraction, so decided it was time to move on to multiplication and division. Maths isn't my thing. I didn't like it at school so I do know that I will need help with this as Miss Personality gets older. I probably would even consider hiring a tutor at some point. But for now Miss Personality and I can use the resource we have to keep extending on what she already knows till we get to a point where I feel like I need more assistance with this.

But for today it was the multiplication game I made up last week. At first I made cards for the times tables I know she knows, which are 2,3,5,10,11. All she has to do is match the times table with the right answer. She loved it so much even asked if she could play it on the weekend. YAY!  Today Miss Personality asked if I could make up cards for the 6 times tables. She played the match up game a couple of times with just the 6 times tables, then we added these to the rest and played the match up game with all of them. At first she felt a bit overwhelmed and thought she couldn't do it, but before she knew it she had matched them all up and was feeling pretty impressed with herself. I love seeing the look of not only happiness but also confidence when she has achieved something herself.

Then when she was ready to move on, I asked her to do one page out of a work book we had bought a while ago. The page she did today was on addition and subtraction fact families. Was a good way to do some revision on stuff she has already done, and keep it fresh in her mind.