After our camping trip, I found I had no time for the weekly Facebook Live event. Sorry I missed my weekly rendez-vous live with you all last week. So this week I spent over 20 minutes talking live. The topic? Math options.
Love it or hate it, math is essential. I happen to love it. My kids like math. Like reading, the more you do it, the more you love it.
English provides us with great sayings that rhyme, like “drill and kill.” As I was researching ways to teach math, in the beginning of my homeschool career, I learned about “drill and kill.” First off, it made me chuckle. Secondly, I was not sure I agreed with it. It really depends on how much you drill. Thirdly, our math muscle needs lots of exercise to build math muscle memory.
College admissions officers say that homeschoolers know history and language arts, but not so much math. So I purposed in my heart to teach math to my children and teach it well. As a result, my children tell people that math is their favorite subject. On an off day, our son says coding and our daughter says art, which are both true. But if they really stop and think about it, math comes to the top of the list, too.
Growing up, I had three math teachers: one for grades 1-4, one for grades 5-8, and one for grades 9-12. First a lady, Mrs. Giurescu, then Mr. Chiriac, then Mr. Duta. All great math teachers, who instilled in me not just a good knowledge of math, but also an appreciation of its importance.
None of this attitude like I heard others say in the US, “One more day and I have not used algebra.” We use math every day, whether we realize it or not. In my house, we love math so much, we go to math competitions.