Posted by admin on
July 10, 2011
And what has your child been learning?
Teachers know that summer break sets most children back several months in their achievement. That’s why they spend September and October reviewing last year’s concepts. For some children, the first few days of school are like starting all over again from scratch!
Don’t let your child be one of the ones who are way behind when the school bell rings this fall. Keep your kid’s mind engaged all summer long. Read together and insist that older kids read on their own, too. And don’t just read; respond to the books in some way. Have a discussion, write a report, make a poster, whatever! And keep doing math, as well. Put your child to work doing age-appropriate math tasks that are a part of everyday life. Make change, tell time, measure things, add things up, and so forth.
Head out to a few museums, parks, zoos and similar community outings to make science and social studies connections. Visit the library at least once a week.
You can make a huge difference in your child’s academic readiness for the coming school year—Don’t blow it!
Posted by admin on
September 30, 2010
Summer is over so Virtual Summer School Online will be out of session until May.
When Summer School is back in session we will be ready for you with make up courses and a bunch of extracurricular summer fun courses.
See you in May!!
Posted by admin on
April 25, 2010
Schools around the country are steadily increasing their requirements for mathematics education, and lamentably, many high schoolers are finding it difficult to keep up with these demands. Some areas require four years’ worth of math classes for graduation, and at least one state mandates that students pass an Algebra II class to get a diploma. Match this up with students who are calculator-dependent and cannot perform even the simplest of calculations, and the picture gets pretty grim. High school students are struggling with the increased math requirements and literally spending hours on homework assignments. Parents ask what they can do to help their students be more successful in math, and the simplest answer is to make sure basic computation skills are mastered (preferably in elementary school).
No matter what age your pupil may be, though, it’s not too late to firm up the basic calculation skills. If your child or teen is struggling with math, check his or her competency at computation. It’s vital that students master these basic skills so they can be successful with more abstract concepts.
Think of math skills as forming a pyramid of sorts. We all know that when you build a pyramid from toy blocks, you can start with a bottom row of five blocks, put a row of four on top of them, then a row of three, a row of two, and finally a crowning single block on the very top. The triangle-shaped wall of blocks is pretty stable if you’ve balanced all of the pieces correctly.
Math skills are much like this pyramid. The blocks on the bottom row represent mastery of basic computation skills, like memorizing math facts and understanding place value and regrouping. The upper levels of blocks represent skills like working with fractions and decimals, learning algebraic concepts, and even things like calculus and higher math.
Take our thought experiment one step farther and push a block or two out of that bottom row in the pyramid. These missing blocks represent basic computation skills, remember. What happens to the entire pyramid if those blocks are misplaced or missing all together? The entire structure is shaky at best, and usually will not stand at all. Math is just like that. Without the basic skills in place, it’s nearly impossible to master the higher level concepts.
So now is a great time to make sure your math student has the skills needed to strengthen up that math pyramid. A student entering grade 3 should be able to complete the 100 basic addition and subtraction combinations with nearly 100% accuracy. By the end of grade 4, students should be able to answer all the 100 basic multiplication and division facts with nearly 100% accuracy. By grade six, the time to answer 100 basic facts in all four operations should be down to nearly 3 minutes, with five minutes being a maximum time needed to answer with nearly100% accuracy.
Want to check your student’s performance? The links below offer printable math worksheets suitable for checking how students are doing and for practicing.
Free Addition Worksheets
Free Subtraction Worksheets
Free Multiplication Worksheets
Free Division Worksheets