Homeschool Math Blog

You might feel that your kid/students will never be able to take part in any math contest, but this one is different. It is for everybody, and you don't have to solve any math problems at all. Crazy 4 Math contest simply asks you to... "Describe how you use math in any activity you love to do - a sport, game, craft, hobby or anything else. Send in a description of the activity and how you use math. You can also include a drawing or diagram. Class entries are also accepted. All participants will receive an MP3 of Googol Power's new song "Crazy 4 Math" when you enter." So this might be a nice way to motivate a student, plus underline the fact, like I've mentioned before, that math is part of our life - not some obscure 'no-one needs it' type of thing. I encourage you to check some of the last year's entries at Crazy4Math.com . Teachers: you can submit a class entry too.

I've just finished writing a review on Dr. Math&reg algebra books by The Math Forum. There are two: one for pre-algebra and one for algebra 1 students. They are NOT algebra textbooks because they don't have any exercises. Rather, they're supplemental. BUT they're very nice AND fairly inexpensive (around $9-10 new, and maybe $6-7 used). Also they weren't awfully long; both were under 200 pages with clear layout. I really think you should take a look at these if you or your student has trouble with algebra! Dr. Math's books are written in a very easy-reading and friendly tone. They are compiled from question-answers that real students have asked the Dr. Math® service at The Math Forum over the years. It's like reading letters, in a sense, but they deal with math questions. And these letters or explanations are not reading like a textbook but more like a real teacher talking. One thing I liked was that the books included some 'philosophical' quest...

I just read a very inspirational article Teenager or Tyke, Students Learn Best by Tackling Challenging Math (PDF) ( html ). It tells about two teachers who frequently employ open-ended problem-solving sessions in their teaching - and the students (almost all) like it well and are very motivated. In math education, OPEN-ENDED problem usually means it doesn't have a specific step-by-step solution. You can solve it in many different ways. Or, it may have more than one solution. The problems these teachers use are often from real life, and not quick to solve. Instead it can take some time and struggling to get anywhere. (Hey, that's how problems in real life often are, too!) But, struggling can be valuable. One of the teachers featured in the article, Heidi Ewer, says: "Struggling helps them see this as an investment of their own time and energy. It makes them more willing to learn," Ewer says. "Struggling to solve problems requires students to use their intuiti...

I got this in an email... so I'm "forwarding" it to all of you. A touching story about choices in all of our lives. What would you do? You make the choice! Don't look for a punch line; there isn't one! Read it anyway. My question to all of you is: Would you have made the same choice? At a fundraising dinner for a school that serves learning disabled children, the father of one of the students delivered a speech that would never be forgotten by all who attended. After extolling the school and its dedicated staff, he offered a question: "When not interfered with by outside influences, everything nature does is done with perfection. Yet my son, Shay, cannot learn things as other children do. He cannot understand things as other children do. Where is the natural order of things in my son?" The audience was stilled by the query. The father continued. "I believe, that when a child like Shay, physically and mentally handicapped comes into the world, an ...

How can you prove that irrational*non-zero rational number is equal to an irrational number? I suspect this is a university student asking me this. One important step in how to make proofs is to understand clearly what you're asked to prove. It often involves statements that are true for ALL numbers in a certain set (such as all real numbers, all rational numbers etc.). This one does not include the word "all" nor the word "any", but it still is of that type. I can reword it like this: Prove that any irrational number multiplied by any non-zero rational number is equal to some irrational number. Or, this way: Prove that for all irrational numbers x and for all rational numbers y excluding 0 the following is true: xy is an irrational number. This question basically ASKS for indirect proof. In indirect proof, we assume the OPPOSITE is true, and show that would lead to a contradiction. We are supposed to prove that if you take ANY irrational number times ANY non-z...

This week's Carnival of Homeschooling is up at PHAT Mommy . Again, lots of interesting stuff to read about homeschooling.

Time4Learning.com is an online curriculum covering not only math but language arts, science, and social studies. I've done a review on their mathematics curriculum (their content is provided by Compasslearning Odyssey). It's quite motivating, because kids get to do these animated lessons and on lower grades they can aftewards go to "playground". My child sure likes it a lot! Read my review and see some pics at Homeschoolmath.net/reviews/time4learning.php Tags: math , lessons , curriculum