Since she is better at math than I am, you can imagine. But we are making progress, especially now that Heebie-Geebie and one of my homeschooling students have hooked me up with some books that actually make sense. (Thanks, y'all!)
OTOH, as I discovered recently, the kid has not ever learned her times table. Or "times facts" as they are apparently called now. In fact, when I drew out a times table for her to fill in, she was mesmerized.
"What is that?" she demanded.
I showed her how it worked, filling in a few of the squares.
She yanked the table from under my hands. "Look," she said, filling in more. "Look! It's all patterns!"
"Uh," I said. "Yeah. That's the cool part. But--"
"Look! Diagonals!"
She sees patterns in numbers where I see nothing at all. "Okay, but--"
"And look what the nines do!"
"But you still have to memorize them!"
"Oh, Ma. You're no fun."
2 comments:
I love the finger trick with nines: i.e. for 6 x 9 you put up ten fingers then bend down the sixth. You have five fingers, gap, then four fingers. Tada: 54!
(and it always adds up to nine, at least thru 10x9.)
Did they pan out? I'm so glad!
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