Life of Fred

What would you like to know?  My 8yo and 6yo have been using Fred for about a year and a half.  They don’t have delays (actually, the opposite), but if you have questions I’ll tell you what I can.  We’ve done Apples thru Ice Cream.

I love it, my kids either like or love it depending who you ask but even liking it is a major change from any math we’ve done!

I talked and e-mail Mr. Schmidt himself (you can get the number and e-mail address on the website, how cool is that!?!) for questions I had and to know which books would be best to use.

His books are very different from any other program, you would not feel that your son has a delay, there is no rush and yet they do end up learning a lot, without having to do a tone of worksheets.

What age is your child?  Mine is nearly 13 and about half way through the intermediate books.  It is a lot of pressure free review for him at the moment.  Right now my goal is simply for him to learn to enjoy math again.  

All good info. here. I will add that you can always have the child do the book again for struggling learners. That said, I have one child who was using LOF independently and ended up cheating due to her not getting it. LOF is going to be her summer supplement from now on. She is using Ray’s Arithmetic because she needs the interaction with me, and I need to keep on top of where she is at. I feel I can tailor her needs better this way.

My math whiz son and highschoolers use LOF as a stand alone, and it’s plenty of material.

Hth,

C

I absolutely love Life of Fred. This is our second year using it.  One thing I suggest, because it works well for us, is for each child to keep a notebook of “math stories” — whenever the child has difficulty solving a problem, once we’ve solved it, the child writes a story using his favorite characters/ themes, showing step-by-step how to solve that kind of problem.  Then they can refer back to that story later if they get stuck again.  I’m sure there are other ways to accomplish the same thing, but this is fun for the kids.  Sometimes, for instance if somebody is getting burned out & needs to finish quickly, I’ll let them dictate a story and I’ll copy it down for them. 

I hope you all enjoy Fred!

FWIW, here are two from my kids:

From my Beginning Algebra student:  “Toothless found a piece of paper that Hiccup had discarded. It was all crumpled up. This is what it said, ‘Combine and Simplify:’  (this next part is hard to type; it’s a couple of complicated fractions like 4w squared over 4w squared times z plus 6 wz squared MINUS 9 z squared over 4w squared times z plus 6wz squared)”  

“Grabbing a charred stick, he smiled and set to work solving it, as follows…”  Then she has the steps written out:  “1) He turned it into an addition problem, 2) He combined it, 3) He simplified the denominator, 4) Then he did the top; he’d learned this trick earlier, 5) He cancelled out all that could be cancelled, 6) He had his answer:  2w-3z/2wz.” (She demonstrates each step, but I won’t type that all out here)

From my youngest student, a sixth grader:  “Eelster [an eel character he made up]’s mother made 240 cookies. He dug into the DELICIOUS PILE OF WUNDERTREATS immediately, but his Mom said to save 2/3 of them. How many cookies were not to be eaten yet?” His solution: “First, divide 240 by 3.  80 is one-third. But you need 2/3, so 80 x 2 = 160.  160 cookies should be saved for later. Of course, Eelster snitched 16 more. He’s in trouble now, all right!” 

Some of them also like to illustrate their stories.

I love the math stories jotawatt! Pure genius! Thanks for sharing.

I tried LOF a couple of years ago with my older daughter – at that time they did not have the elem books, but I got Fractions for her. I was very surprised that she did not enjoy the story at all – it really annoyed her. I found it hilarious LOL. We have eventually found that Math U See is a perfect fit for her and she has become at 13 a rabid mathematician.

I am back to LOF again with my 9 yo son (Math U See was way too overwhelming for him at this point), starting with the Apples book. He is warming to it, and although he will not admit to enjoying any book work, I catch him talking about things he learned in the book. At first I too felt that we needed to do “more problems” or something, but I see the value now of giving him time to think about the concepts. We have finished Apples and I haven’t yet got the next book, but I plan to soon and to keep going with LOF for Max, and now his older sister is curious LOL. She always listens to the Fred lesson.  Maybe she might want a LOF algebra book?

Delays? Public school would say that my son is delayed. He is not reading to grade level. He does not write or spell well. I don’t think he has any kind of disability, his schedule for development is just a little different that pub school schedule, I think. I do read the stories in LOF out loud to him, usually, or we read them aloud together. Then I let him read the questions on his own, and check his own work. He loves checking his own work!