Hi Melissa,
Thank you so much for your kind words. I just read about some of the struggles you are having with your older children on another post and hope this note finds you refreshed this morning and enjoying the Peace that surpasses all understanding. Your Thursday Thanksgiving pictures are beautiful.
Your questions:
First, your parochial school experience: Historically, many things are counted in 12’s – 12 inches in a foot, 12 in a dozen, 12 months in a year (to name a few) and having a base of 12 makes it convenient to convert fractions. Before the decimalization of British currency in 1971, there were 12 pennies in a shilling. This is most probably why the tables were previously taught to 12. Today, most cultures have a decimal currency system. The decimal system (based on 10) is what we generally use in math and the metric system is a decimal system so depending on your age and where you went to school (even which state and teacher) probably determined whether you learned your tables to 10 or 12. The gridded notebooks I buy for math have the tables up to 12 on the back (we teach up to 10).
As a side note, even Irene Stephens, Ambleside’s lecturer on mathematics, bemoaned the British Imperial System of measurement when the metric system made for simpler calculations.
Your other question: I hope what Ruth meant is that the handbook is not a textbook that you can open up and do the days work. Just as CM’s use of great literature, narration, copywork, and poetry really changes our modern thought on the way our children learn “language arts” her ideas and methods surrounding math truly make it “living.” Charlotte appealed to the beauty and truth of mathematics, and believed that by presenting math in such a living way it trained the child in good habits and would also point to God and His glory.
If you have 15-20 minutes a day to spend with your child on math, you can apply her methods. Any textbook I would recommend as closest to CM still requires mom or dad to be with the child as oral work and mental arithmetic are fundamental in ensuring understanding before preceding to written work.
It is a relatively short read of 100 pages and is designed to both take you through her over-riding philosophy as well as a practical, step-by-step way to teach specifics. You can download the sample to see exactly which topics are covered. For example, Chapter 2 lays out how to teach one through nine, the meanings of symbols, when and how to introduce the writing of numbers and how often to use written work, the number 10, notation and idea of place value, etc. covering the ground all the way through Elementary Arithmetic which ends with five steps to lead your child how to discover the rule for finding “area.”
I hope it’s a help.
Warmly,
Richele
