Category Archives: Math

Geography, Math

Math-and-Geographa-Funnies

We use Math-U-See too, but I didn’t see where there this story was going until Kathy Jo explained:

Sam (five-year-old son): “Mama, I don’t know if I do eight or nine. They both suck.”

Ahem. Alright, this one both shocked and confused me for a moment, and I wasn’t sure whether to laugh or be horrified. I asked him to repeat himself to be sure I understood correctly– and I had. And then I finally realized what he was trying to tell me.

He’s been doing Math-U-See, and I love the way it teaches the math facts to the little guys. You see, nine wants to be ten, so when it’s added to another number, it sucks away one unit from the other number like a vacuum cleaner. Sam hasn’t completely mastered the nine math facts yet, but he’s gotten very fast at giving me the answers. So today we started the eight math facts. It turns out that eight also wants to be ten, so it sucks away two units from the other number.

Hence, when he came across the problem 9 + 8, he wasn’t sure which way to figure out the problem as eight and nine both suck.

Good golly, is that funny. An hour later, I’m still giggling.

There’s a good geography story in Kathy Jo’s story, too. My kids have soaked up a lot of geography over dinner, both with map placemats or (their favorite) sometimes I put a large world map under a clear vinyl tablecloth on the dinner table. The plastic bugs me, or else I’d leave it that way all the time. Whenever I do ditch the pretty blue cotton tablecloth for the map & plastic combo, the kids get very excited. Their peas are quite the little globetrotters. (“Mom, look, it rolled to Peru!”)

And then there’s our old pal Mr. Putty. He has become such a part of the family that I stuck him up there in the sidebar alongside all the kids. These days he is spending a lot of time in Egypt during our read-aloud of The Golden Goblet. Then he moseys to Rome. When we go swimming, somebody dunks him in an ocean: his goal is to visit every major body of water on Earth by the end of next month. I think that includes rivers and lakes. My children really love pool season.

Speaking of geography stories, Karen had a good one this week.

Math

My Head Hurts

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From Unity of Truth: “Are all infinities the same?“

Well, it seems obvious that that there must be twice as many numbers if you count the half numbers as well as the whole numbers, and three times as many if you count the 1/3 numbers as well as the whole numbers – indeed six times as many if you count halves, thirds, and whole numbers.

But what is obvious is not always true.

There are no more half numbers than whole numbers, because if you line up all the half you can count them – using whole numbers — for as long as you want. So there aren’t any more.

Read the rest.

Fun Learning Stuff, Math

Bubble Gum Math

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A while back, Wonderboy’s OT gave me a booklet to read about something called “Suck-Swallow-Breathe Synchrony.” At first glance, I wouldn’t have expected it to revitalize the study of math in my home, but that is exactly what has happened.

The booklet describes how the coordinating of these three actions—sucking, swallowing, and breathing—is the brain’s first major task after a baby is born. Successful “SSB Synchrony” lays the groundwork for umpteen other developmental milestones down the road. The entire discussion was fascinating, but what really jumped out at me was the description of how, later in life, the brain uses SSB synchrony as a tension reliever or to help focus on other tasks. This is why Michael Jordan sticks out his tongue when he’s playing basketball. This is why people chew on pens, mints, and fingernails. This (I now realize) is why I seem to be incapable of writing a novel without consuming vast quantities of gummy bears or gumballs. I always thought it had to do with being a sugar junkie. I now understand that it’s about the chewing—it helps my brain to concentrate on the work.

Adults, the booklet explained, quite unconsciously avail themselves of the concentration aid provided by oral stimulation. I am reminded of the editorial meetings of my past: almost everyone at the table had something to sip, munch, or chew. Kids gnaw pencils in school, but gum isn’t usually allowed, for obvious and logical reasons. But our OT told about how she used to work in a school for the deaf, and when she convinced the parents to allow the kids access to pretzels and gummy worms while they did their schoolwork, productivity skyrocketed. A child who would normally have spent 45 minutes struggling through a page of math was now finishing his work in 10 minutes.

My kids, having heard snippets of this conversation, immediately saw the possibilities.

“Let’s test the theory!” cried Jane, my junior scientist.

“Mommy, where’s some gum?” asked Rose, wasting no time. “Let’s all do some math and see if it works.”

“I want to do math too!” wailed Beanie, who, being only four, hasn’t yet climbed on the family Math-U-See bandwagon.

“Mom will make up some problems for you,” reassured practical Rose.

And so began a routine that now occurs several times a week, unprompted by me. The kids get out math books, and that’s my cue to produce some gum. They chomp contentedly and work with impressive concentration. Whether the Impressive Concentration is indeed the effect of the gum, or whether it is the effect of the desire to continue getting gum (heretofore a rare luxury), I cannot say. And I don’t much care.

Truth be told, Jane is one of those people who loves numbers and patterns and mathematical puzzles and formulas. She is working through her great-uncle’s latest college math textbook for fun. I know, I know, it seems weird to me too. But then, when I look at a window with twelve panes, I see twelve rectangles, or maybe thirteen, counting the whole window. Jane sees—oh, I don’t know how many—my brain went numb after she passed the two dozenth rectangle. (Maybe I needed some gum.) She has That Kind of Brain. So really, I’m not sure how much additional assistance the bubble gum is giving her. But what the hey. It cracks me up to hear the girls literally beg me to “let them” do some math. Gee, I’m such a nice mommy—I always say yes.