Trying to transform to CM: HeLp

Hello. I am new to posting here and also new to the CM method. We also currently use Horizons Math for my first grade son and have been enjoying it. Recently, tho, we have hit a brick wall with learning addition and subtraction facts. While working with Andrew to learn these facts, I’m wondering if I’m expecting too much from a first grader. We are trying to learn all the math facts up to and including 9+9=18 and 18-9=9, and he really does very well, as long as he uses a number line or his fingers. (Sometimes he counts in his head, too.) Horizons initially provides a number line with the worksheet problems, but after several lessons, the number line is not included, and Andrew uses his fingers to complete his problems. His answers are almost always correct, but my teachers’ manual suggests that the student should just know the answer without finger counting, due to daily flash cards and drills.

We do use daily drills and flash cards, but the flash cards have become kind of dull. I’ve started trying a different approach, such as memorizing doubles, and then working from there, such as 5+5=10, so 5+6=11. He does well with this as long as I ask him the pairs together. If I ask him 5+6 independently, he can’t give me the answer unless he counts it out. I have a feeling that this approach will eventually click with him if we keep working on it consistently. But then I run into the problem that there doesn’t seem to be any tricks to learning something like 8+5 or 6+8, etc. I’ve tried explaining to him the tricks I use to add nine to a number, (9+6, 9+5, etc.) but he just doesn’t get it, even when I use manipulatives to show him. That’s when I start wondering if I’m expecting too much from a 7 year old.

Andrew has always impressed me with his grasp of math concepts, but I don’t want to cause him to lose interest by pushing him too hard. Can anyone give me any idea of what can be expected from an average first grader? Or do you have other “tricks” for remembering addition and subtraction facts? What would be the CM method for teaching this?

I will greatly appreciate any help that you can offer. This forum is always very helpful!!

With much thanks,

Brenda

Kelli, what other areas are you pondering how to make the transition?

Kelli,

We also started our homeschool with the classical approach, but I have since become interested in Charlotte Mason’s methods, so I am also trying to blend the two approaches.

Here are a couple other ideas that might help you. A teacher friend told me about this website yesterday: coolmath4kids.com This is where I found flash cards to be printed and colored by your child while they repeat the math fact. In their words, “This will connect their right and left brains to help them really remember these things! It will give them visual reinforcement, make them take the time to think about each one (while they are coloring) and it will give them a feeling of ownership to the cards — and to the math.”

I also found this link on the Charlotte Mason Blog Carnival: thecookfamilyzoo.blogspot.com/2008/02/three-period-lesson.html This website describes the Three Period Lesson which I mentioned earlier. I think that it was intended for teaching colors, shapes, letters, numbers, etc., but this website shows that you can modify the lessons for just about anything that you want to teach. It has even inspired me to make a few changes to our spelling lessons. I believe that this website also has a link to a Living Math! website which gives great ideas for some fun math games.

Since I haven’t actually tried my idea yet, I’m not exactly sure how it will all work out. While my son is working on 8+5, I’ll probably also have him work on 5+8. Depending on how that goes, we might include 13-8 and 13-5 also. It might take a few days to get through those four facts, but we probably won’t move on to another set of facts until he knows the first set.

There is something else that we have tried in our math lessons, and I suppose this to be a CM method. If there seems to be too much writing on a worksheet, then I just have my son complete the problems with me orally and mark it as so on the worksheet.

I also like Sonya’s idea of setting the timer and working on the lesson until it beeps. Then we’ll pick up the next day where we left off. This means that we’ll just continue math lessons throughout the summer — which is okay with me since it will keep those concepts fresh in his mind.

I have also been quite content with Horizons Math, and I am thankful to find ways to adapt this math program to a CM style.

I hope this helps.

Brenda

One thing we must think about carefully when discussing Charlotte Mason and “classical” education is what exactly is meant by “classical education” Do we mean The Well-Trained Mind? Or what educators actually did centuries ago? (They did not use The Well-Trained Mind, lol) There are actually sort of two different traditions running through this—a virtue-based, language-rich tradition coming down to us from centuries past, in which Charlotte Mason’s ideas can fit, and the modern, post-Dorothy Sayers “three stages” thing, in which it seems to me Charlotte Mason’s ideas do not mesh as well.

A thing that I have found useful when struggling through this myself (I, too, began my homeschooling thinking of myself as a “classical educator”) are these:

1) What is this learning philosophy’s view of the child? Who is the child? Is he a complete person, or is he an incomplete person into whose head we must pour knowledge so that he can become complete? What is the role of the personality of the child? Is it sacred? By what means may we attempt to educate him? Or are all children basically alike, we simply “program” in the correct knowledge, flip the appropriate switches, and the child becomes educated?

2) What exactly is education? Is it coming to know what everyone else knows? Is it the ability to give great speeches? Is it forming relationships with many things? What exactly is knowledge? Is it just stuff in a child’s head—facts, like grammar rules and memorized lists of Russian czars? Or is it the things which we feel we know or have kinship with, the things we care about, the virtue of our actions, all mixed up together?

3) What is the role of the teacher? Is the teacher a dispenser of head facts–dial in the correct “stage” and the teacher spills info into the student? Or is the teacher a guide, preparing a banquet and helping the child to choose well, guiding by setting guardrails around the child and then letting him choose for himself which of the many items in the banquet he must have?

I know that as I struggled to work through all of this, I was helped immensely by a number of writings of Karen Glass. I don’t know exactly the rules of “posting” things but I can help anyone interested who wants to find these writings if you email me. I also was helped by closely observing my child(ren) and then trying to match up what I saw with these two “educationviews” and this affected the choices I made about things like grammar and other areas of difference.

Well, I could go on all day but I’d likely bore you all to tears. LOL

Michelle D