Besides being the name of our occupational therapy office, positive steps, is how I feel we are moving this week.
Cameron is in 4th grade and that means multiplication, division and the ever disturbing fractions. Until now, fractions seemed to be an easy task for Cameron. Sure it's easy when they ask you to identify the colored part of a figure. Try adding and subtracting fractions, finding common denominators and simplifying and we are in a whole new ball game. How do you explain that 2/7 is smaller than 2/3 when he sees 7 as a larger number. I found that drawing a candy bar and explaining it that way sure helps. He now understands that he would rather have 2 parts of a candy bar split into 3 parts rather than one split into 7. Who wouldn’t?
I have literally been walking Cameron through the process of adding and subtracting fractions with whole numbers for the past week or two. Cameron has a mid unit quiz on this Friday and I'm not sure how he'll do.
I digress, you want to know what the positive steps are. I helped Cam complete today's math assignment but sent him to complete yesterday's on his own. The assignment consisted of two word problems consisting of adding fractions and comparing. The answer was yes or no. He got them both right but could not explain how. Me thinks he guessed. I know that the second one was surely a guess as the explanation he wrote made no sense to the problem whatsoever except it was about 9 parts of 12 and he used 9 as a denominator.
I specifically opted out of self-pacing this year as I did not want to deal with this. Do I need to purchase a stock of Hershey bars and use them to explain each problem? How do I keep him from eating his math homework? He has an A+ in math and doing poorly on this test will not cause him to fail 4th grade but I'm so proud of his accomplishment that I hate to see him fail at this point.
Glenn did understand fractions until he started picture framing in the early 90's. I hate to see Cameron spend the next 10 years in utter confusion. He wants to be a helicopter pilot and I think that math and science are two subjects he needs to excel in.
Math is my forte. My degree is in accounting and computers. It's aggravating to me to see him struggle with math. I often find myself dreaming about his problems trying to come up with simpler solutions to explain the process.
Fortunately, we only have 16 days of school, 4 testing days and 1 field trip until school lets out. I don’t know who is looking forward to it more, me or him. He is in the stage of hating school and I’m in the stage of wishing it were summer.
Most parents don’t exactly look forward to summer as they have to decide what to do with their children. As a home schooling parent, I don’t have those issues. It’s actually a vacation for me too as I don’t have to schedule my day around his classes or getting a test submitted on time. I can sleep in and we can go out to lunch. I think Cameron and I will have to plan a special activity for June 5th when he gets out of school.
Cameron is in 4th grade and that means multiplication, division and the ever disturbing fractions. Until now, fractions seemed to be an easy task for Cameron. Sure it's easy when they ask you to identify the colored part of a figure. Try adding and subtracting fractions, finding common denominators and simplifying and we are in a whole new ball game. How do you explain that 2/7 is smaller than 2/3 when he sees 7 as a larger number. I found that drawing a candy bar and explaining it that way sure helps. He now understands that he would rather have 2 parts of a candy bar split into 3 parts rather than one split into 7. Who wouldn’t?
I have literally been walking Cameron through the process of adding and subtracting fractions with whole numbers for the past week or two. Cameron has a mid unit quiz on this Friday and I'm not sure how he'll do.
I digress, you want to know what the positive steps are. I helped Cam complete today's math assignment but sent him to complete yesterday's on his own. The assignment consisted of two word problems consisting of adding fractions and comparing. The answer was yes or no. He got them both right but could not explain how. Me thinks he guessed. I know that the second one was surely a guess as the explanation he wrote made no sense to the problem whatsoever except it was about 9 parts of 12 and he used 9 as a denominator.
I specifically opted out of self-pacing this year as I did not want to deal with this. Do I need to purchase a stock of Hershey bars and use them to explain each problem? How do I keep him from eating his math homework? He has an A+ in math and doing poorly on this test will not cause him to fail 4th grade but I'm so proud of his accomplishment that I hate to see him fail at this point.
Glenn did understand fractions until he started picture framing in the early 90's. I hate to see Cameron spend the next 10 years in utter confusion. He wants to be a helicopter pilot and I think that math and science are two subjects he needs to excel in.
Math is my forte. My degree is in accounting and computers. It's aggravating to me to see him struggle with math. I often find myself dreaming about his problems trying to come up with simpler solutions to explain the process.
Fortunately, we only have 16 days of school, 4 testing days and 1 field trip until school lets out. I don’t know who is looking forward to it more, me or him. He is in the stage of hating school and I’m in the stage of wishing it were summer.
Most parents don’t exactly look forward to summer as they have to decide what to do with their children. As a home schooling parent, I don’t have those issues. It’s actually a vacation for me too as I don’t have to schedule my day around his classes or getting a test submitted on time. I can sleep in and we can go out to lunch. I think Cameron and I will have to plan a special activity for June 5th when he gets out of school.
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