Name: CHEC Rocky Mountain Homeschool Conference
Start: 2025-06-12T00:00:00-05:00
End: 2025-06-14T23:59:59-05:00
Location: Denver, CO

Tagged: Multiplication, teaching textbooks

This topic has 23 replies, 11 voices, and was last updated 11 years, 4 months ago by amama5.

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January 22, 2014 at 2:05 am
greenebalts
Participant
I think Angelina is on to something. I’m going to play devil’s advocate here for a moment.

I’ve used several math programs over the years with one graduate, 12th grader, 4th grader, and dyslexic 3rd grader. All programs I’ve experienced teach the facts, but it’s up to the teacher to ensure the student understands and masters those facts. One difference I’ve noticed between programs is some math programs teach more strategies for learning facts. For example, 9+3 = ? If you learn the 10’s strategy you take a 1 from the 3 to make 9 a 10 then it’s easier to add 10 + 2 to get 12. I feel these strategies are very important for higher level mathematics. I wonder if we’re missing the boat here by teaching memorization vs. logic/thinking skills?

I’ve been spending too much time doing math research because I was totally stressing over things like kids not retaining facts, lol. But, what I’m finding is children need to understand things like multiplication being fast adding vs. just flashing a card with numbers to be memorized. Richelle gave an excellent example on teaching multiplication in this blog post….

http://barefootvoyage.blogspot.com/2013/11/multiplication-using-charlotte-masons.html

I also think the multiplication chart that Angelina mentioned with manipulatives helps the child to visualize what multiplication means. I love the montessori multiplication board. I don’t have one, but keep trying to think of a way to make one 🙂

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jN5zKYXCtpY

I wonder if fact mastery comes with maturation. I remember timed tests and flashcards in school over and over and over again. I still struggled with the 7, 8, & 9 facts. It wasn’t until later, that I discovered strategies like the 10’s one I mentioned above and the lightbulb went on. Maybe it was maturation or maybe it was the strategy, either way I can rattle off facts like crazy now, lol.

I think games are an excellent way for kids to learn facts. There’s something about a healthy competition that breeds learning. RightStart has a Math Games kit that’s excellent. I think I mentioned this on another thread, but I will say it again, a good math program gives you strategies and games or other tools to reinforce those strategies.

Go to the Dump is excellent for learning facts of 10. Remove 10’s and face cards from deck, deal each player 5 cards and put the rest in the middle. The object is to make pairs of 10, like 6 & 4, 3 & 7, etc. You take turns asking the other player for a card you need to make 10. If they don’t have you, you “Go to the Dump”, kinda like Go Fish. When the cards are all paired up, whoever has the most pairs, wins.

War is another fun game to practice facts. Again remove face cards, this time keeping 1-10’s in the deck. Deal out all cards. Do not look at your cards. Both players flip the top card from the pile and whoever has the highest takes both cards. The person who ends with all the cards, wins. When the child understands numeration, you can move on to flipping two cards off the pile then adding or subtracting the numbers together (whichever skill you want to work on). The player with the highest total gets all the cards. Again, after all the cards have been flipped, the person with the most cards wins.

I have heard great things about Rapid Recall. I have not personally used it, but have a SIL that’s had success with it.

Blessings,
Melissa
http://reflectionsfromdrywoodcreek.blogspot.com/

January 22, 2014 at 2:34 am
ruth
Participant
Melissa, I use the AL Abucus from Right Start in the same way as the montesorri multiplication board. My ds will move 3 beads over on 6 rows for 6×3, then count them (we read it as the number 3 is added 6 times). I am having him do flashcards as well and he has figured out some tricks of his own for remembering the facts and has also realized he can change the numbers around to do make it easier to count. 6 times 3 is the same as 3 times 6. I really believe having the manipulatives to work with has helped a lot and he has figured a lot of this stuff out himself. He may just be good at math, I’m not really sure, but it is working well for us.
January 22, 2014 at 2:54 am
greenebalts
Participant
Ruth, that is brilliant! I have an abacus…two as a matter of fact. I never thought of using it as a multiplication board.

Thanks for the suggestion!

P.S. I really am enjoying this conversation. I hope to read more math posts! I used to dread everything about teaching math. Since this forum, working through Mathematics: An Instrument for Living Teaching, and the other research I’ve done, I’ve come to embrace math teaching. I don’t think it’s so much about the curriculum as my approach 🙂
January 22, 2014 at 3:11 am
Angelina
Participant
I’m with Melissa on a lot of the games ideas above. My DS6.5 has has almost no formal math and yet through the card games, War, Go Fish, playing with abacus as well as checkers and (my personal favourite) backgammon…he is proving to be a real little math whiz.   Even though he did no pre-Alpha MUS, and certainly no Alpha, a few months ago I gave him a very topline overview of what I remembered of “making 9” and “making 10” in MUS…and he’s all over it. Just today we were reading Life of Fred (for fun) and he was telling me, “Mama this is stuff I can already figure out because I already know that 4 is one less than 5 and 3 is one more than two…so 4+3 is the same 5+2 !! (big grin on his face…) Uh, yes, sweetie, of course it is.   (was not about to tell him that I SURE as heck did not “get” that at age 6 in grade one…) Wooo hoo, maybe I finally have a mathy kid. Or maybe playing math games and keeping charts visible to our kids (and explaining whenever they ask) is what it really takes.
But I also see what you are saying, Melissa, in your first point above on math strategies. The one point I feel compelled to add though is that the strategies are only good once you memorize them, or if you are kind of person that finds the strategies meaningful. In the example mentioned above (see how many numbers back you are from 10)…I had one kid who found that strategy was brilliant (to be honest I loved it, too), and yet I have another child who found it confusing and is just the kind of person that wants ONLY to know what he NEEDS to know (the THING he needs to memorize) and nothing more. He thinks of it as having a hamburger with NO ketchup or mustard; a salad with no dressing.   Just give me the meat, Mama! (LOL) So, for him, a strategy is just something MORE to memorize. He’d rather just memorize 10+2=12 and 9+3+12…and not give thought as to how similar they are, or how one can help him remember the other.   To each his own, I guess!

Great discussion everyone!
Angie
January 22, 2014 at 3:33 am
amama5
Participant
We love games too, Muggins math games are great because there is one on each side of the game board, and they can all be played at different levels so all my kids can play together. Math Uno is good too, use any math operation to be able to play.
January 22, 2014 at 3:37 am
ServingwithJoy
Participant
Totally agree about it being up to the teacher (parent) to do some kind of fact mastery to ensure accuracy and quickness. We have done all the little tricks and tips, and we use the flashmaster.
But the most helpful thing for multiplication memorization, for us? A wall chart. We review the the times tables – up and down -once a day and do a timed test on the last day of the week. If we need to work on it again the next week, we do.
This has helped not only my 3rd-5th graders with their multiplication facts and speed, but my 2nd grader and kindergartner are memorizing their multiplication facts too ;-).
It takes, possibly, 5 minutes a day.
January 22, 2014 at 3:38 am
ServingwithJoy
Participant
Oops, should have pointed out that we do one number set per week (2’s, then 3’s, etc…). If we aren’t firm in that number set, we do it again the following week.
January 22, 2014 at 4:23 am
greenebalts
Participant
Yes Angelina, I do see what your saying about strategies vs. memorization. And, I definitely agree that each kid has a different way of learning. Mine are all polar opposites….is that possible with five kids and only two poles….LOL!
Isn’t it great when they just get it!! …I also wonder if by not using a formal math program and just letting him explore, so to speak, if he finds it more fun and has less math anxiety. I do think math anxiety really holds kids back. They’re such smart little buggers and they know when it’s taking “too long” or they get every other problem wrong. Our 10 year old really struggles with this. She’s a “Perfect Paula” and two wrong make her freak out. I believe our kids really want to please us and it doesn’t feel good to struggle and to know you are struggling.

Applying math to real life and making it meaningful is also super important, IMHO.

I gotta tell ya, when I went to say good night to our kiddos, the 8 & 10 year old were in deep discussion wondering what a quadrillion $1 bills would look like. Our son said, “Mom, do you think the stack would be as tall as our silo?” Ha….I have no idea, but I’d love to find out :))
January 23, 2014 at 2:44 pm
amama5
Participant
Here are two great websites I found, one is pretty busy looking with some ads, but I’ve made great worksheets, and they have games/tutorials/videos too. I also found out the website I use for making copywork sheets has math/geography, etc too! http://www.worksheetworks.com
http://www.math-drills.com
the games/videos are on http://www.mathplayground.com