K-3 Math Helper
Using the
The Importance of Parent Involvement
What you say matters!
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Parents what you say to your child matters.
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90% of all learning takes place at home
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Comments such as: “I
was never good at math (spelling, reading…etc.)” should be avoided.
Statements like this gives your child permission to fail.
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Positive reinforcement:
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We can work on this for five minutes everyday
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We can learn it together
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We can make it fun and simple
How to Study and Get Results
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Environment that allows the student to focus
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This is individual to each student
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Study should be in regular, doable intervals
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Model: Half hour of work – ten minute break
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Frustration yields no results!
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Avoid emotional conflict – Step away from the work!
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Take a walk
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Have a snack
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Get out and get moving
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Then come back and try a different approach
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Learning is
active!
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Reading – out loud
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Math – work it out on paper and verbally
Sample Study Schedule
Snack
After School Activity
10 to 30 Minutes of Math
Take a Break
Finish out remaining work
Take a Break
10 to 30 Minutes of
*Incorporate Handbook
Activities throughout the day
For More Tips go to
www.chapinpinottilearningcenter.com
Kindergarten-Third
Parent/Student
Math Activities
Grade by Grade – The Early Years
In Kindergarten you can help your student learn:
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to count, name and compare objects and sets
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addition and subtraction
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to recognize what numbers are missing from a set of numbers
In First Grade you can help your student learn:
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to count and group objects by 1s, 2s, 5s and 10s to 100
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to identify coins
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to order and complete simple word problems
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to measure objects
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to identify common geometric figures
In Second Grade you can help your student learn:
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to understand place value and number relationships in addition and subtraction
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simple concepts of multiplication
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to measure with appropriate units
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to classify shapes and see relationships and patterns
In Third Grade you can help your student learn:
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learning to count, compare and round whole numbers to 10,000
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add, subtract, multiply and divide numbers and money
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compare and solve fractions
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understand the relationship between fractions and decimals
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Know the
difference between units to measure
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Estimate
or determine area and volume of solid figures
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Convert
simple units within a system of measure – hours to minutes, inches to feet
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Identify
and classify shapes and figures
Number Sense
3rd Grade:
Count, read and write whole numbers to 10,000.
Compare and order whole numbers to 10,000. Identify the place value
for each digit in numbers to 10,000
2nd Grade:
The standards are the same, but
perform skill up to the 1000s
1st Grade:
The standards are the same, but perform skill up to the 100s
Counting
Kids love to count anything.
Use car time to count telephone poles and signs and cars and trees.
Help them recognize that numbers are all around us and get them actively
looking!
Grocery Shopping
The grocery store will appear several times throughout the math content
standards as it is an excellent “classroom” for grade school students.
For students learning to count and read numbers have students count the
cans of their favorite soda, boxes of their favorite cereal or cartons of milk
in a given row.
Around the House
Movies or CDs on shelves provide the opportunity to learn to count and to
help learn order of numbers.
Divide movies or CDs on a shelf into half and ask your child to count each side
and tell you which is greater. This
is a great visual because movies are all the same size and so are CDs.
Books can work if they are close in size.
So can cans on shelves or pencils by the phone or crayons in a box.
Games
Playing cards helps students learn to order numbers.
Any game will do.
Board games that require pieces to move around help with learning to
count spaces and other things.
Help students recognize numbers by having them play
“Driving 1,2,3”.
This is an easy game where each person must find a one and then a two and
then a three…until one person reaches the predetermined end number.
The first person to reach the predetermined number wins.
Challenge older students to find numbers in magazines – up to the
millions! Keep a collage on the
refrigerator – add to it each time a new number in the hundred-thousands or
millions is found. Write the number
word next to the number for better recognition.
Number Sense 2.0
1st Grade –
Students demonstrate the meaning of addition and subtraction and use these
operations to solve problems.
2nd Grade –
Students estimate, calculate, and solve problems involving addition and
subtraction of two-and three-digit numbers: And, 3.0: Students model and
solve simple problems involving multiplication and division.
3rd Grade –
Students calculate and solves problems using addition, subtraction,
multiplication and division.
Grocery Store
After counting is mastered go to a row of a particular item – boxes of
rice for example. Have your child
count the boxes before you select the item, tell him/her how many you need and
let him/her take them off of the shelf.
Now, ask how many are left.
Have him/her say the problem.
“There are ten boxes of rice, we need four, when I take four off of the shelf
there are six left. Ten minus four
equals six.”
Have your child count the number of items in your cart.
“We have five things in our cart, when I add these four more we will have
nine things altogether”. Encourage
your child to use math language.
Go to the bananas and use the bunches for adding and subtracting.
“If I need 15 bananas and I have a bunch of eight, how many more bananas
will I need?”
Help students work through estimation by looking at prices or a group of
items and “guess” how many they are.
Teach them that if something is over five you round up and if something
is four or less you round down.
Number Sense 2.0
1st Grade –
Students demonstrate the meaning of addition and subtraction and use these
operations to solve problems.
2nd Grade –
Students estimate, calculate, and solve problems
involving addition and subtraction of two-and three-digit numbers: And, 3.0:
Students model and solve simple problems involving multiplication and
division.
3rd Grade –
Students calculate and solves problems using addition, subtraction,
multiplication and division.
Grocery Store Multiplication
Start the multiplication process by looking at how many rows of their
favorite cereal are in the section.
Next, look at how many boxes are in each row.
Explain what you are doing and why.
This is multiplication – and say the word.
Use the visual of colorful boxes or cans.
Count orally, later have students count to themselves.
Three rows of six boxes is eighteen boxes.
Point it out and count the boxes – “Yes, three rows of six boxes or three
times six is eighteen.”
Point out that it does not matter if you count columns or rows – the
numbers will be the same! This is
the magic of multiplication. Order
does not matter.
Sixes can be difficult – use the visual of a six pack.
Every grocery store
Point out that if you have zero rows of a product you will have nothing –
ever!
Bring a tablet and have your child keep a running total of everything in
the cart…add it up in sections. See
how close you get to the subtotal.
Games
Challenge older students to
Numbers Go-Fish. The general
rules are the same as ordinary Go-Fish, the tricky part is in the addition.
Choose a number to start with, say nine.
The first “pack” a player puts down has to equal nine (either by addition
or subtraction for younger players or multiplication or division for older
players), the next ten and so forth until you reach a predetermined number.
Begin by saying: “Today we will start at nine and count up until 25.
Out and About
When driving count rows of trees or grape vines, count cows or houses.
Talk about things after you count. “If you had seven rows of trees and
each row had five trees in it – how many trees would you have in all?”
Number Sense 3.0 and 4.0
2nd Grade –
Students understand that fractions and decimals may refer to parts of a set
and parts of a whole.
3rd Grade –
Students understand that fractions and decimals may refer to parts of a set
and parts of a whole.
In the Kitchen
For starters, get out a set of measuring cups and five regular glasses of
the same size. Fill each measuring
cup and then dump them into the glasses.
Talk with our child about what a half vs. a quarter cup is.
Bake chocolate chip cookies and double the recipe.
Any cooking or baking is a great way to demonstrate fractions.
Recipes are full of math – having your child help out in the kitchen will
help them discover fractions in a fun way.
Baking also helps show students that it is not the same to add ½ and ¼ !
Make everything visual.
Demonstrate and write it out!
In the Garage
Build something together. A
birdhouse is a great way to show ½ and ¼ on a ruler or tape measure.
Design your own – using fractions of an inch rather than full inches.
And then build it…this also works for dollhouse, go-carts…just about
anything.
Back to Food
Pizzas, pies, apples cookies…all of these favorite children’s foods are a
great way to chow fractions. Show
them that ½ of a pizza is the same as 2/4 and that 1/8 and 3/8 equals ½!
Money
The best way to teach beginning decimals is with money.
Have children help with bill paying.
Have them add up the items in the grocery cart…no cheating with a
calculator.
Keep a small pad of paper around, select a couple of items and ask you
child. “If I only have $20.00 will
I have enough to buy these four things?”.
Make a game out of dinner.
Distribute play money and charge for dinner.
Have your children count out their share and work together to add
everything up in the end.
For older children, have them pay with a checkbook and keep a register.
This could be done for everything.
Bathtime $2.25, bedtime story $5.67, a ½ hour of television $3.56…work
together to add up expenses each week.
Algebra
and Functions
2nd Grade:
Use the commutative and associative rules to simplify mental calculations
and to check results.
1st,
2nd, 3rd Grade:
Relate problem situations to number sentences involving addition and
subtraction.
3rd Grade:
Solve simple problems involving a
functional relationship between two quantities (e.g., find the total cost of
multiple items given the cost per unit).
3rd Grade:
Extend and recognize a linear pattern by its
rules (e.g., the number of legs on a given number of horses may be
calculated by counting by 4s or by multiplying the number of horses by 4).
In the Kitchen
The commutative property of addition just means that you can switch the
order the number of things you are adding together and you still get the same
answer. When you are at the dinner
table and you are down to the last bites of food – have you child count the
number of bites of each food: two bites of pasta, two pieces of lettuce and five
string beans to total nine bites left.
Ask him or her if you would still have nine bites left if you eat the
lettuce and then the string beans and then the pasta?
Discuss that when you group things together to add – it doesn’t matter
what order things are in – you will still have the same amount.
You can add the associative rule to this exercise as well.
The associative rule merely says that you can group any set of numbers
together and you will still get the same results.
So you have two bites of pasta, two pieces of lettuce and five string beans for
a total of nine bites. What do you
have if you group the vegetables together (2 pieces of lettuce + 5 string beans)
+ 2 bites of pasta? Will you still
have nine bites? Why?
Associative Chores
Ask your child how long it takes her to do her chores – by chore.
For example, it may take her 12 minutes to do the dishes two nights per
week, three minutes per night to take out the trash and twenty minutes a
Saturday to dust.
Discuss how long it takes her to do her chores.
Add up the total numbers…discuss whether the total time changes if she
dusts for five minutes per day four days a week rather than for twenty minutes
every Saturday…etc.
Algebra
and Functions
2nd Grade:
Use the commutative and associative rules to simplify mental calculations
and to check results.
1st, 2nd,
3rd Grade:
Relate problem situations to number sentences involving addition and
subtraction.
3rd Grade:
Solve simple problems involving a
functional relationship between two quantities (e.g., find the total cost of
multiple items given the cost per unit).
3rd Grade:
Extend and recognize a linear pattern by its
rules (e.g., the number of legs on a given number of horses may be
calculated by counting by 4s or by multiplying the number of horses by 4).
In the Car
Counting cars of different colors and adding them all together can
produce the same discussion as order of vegetables.
If you count twelve cars on the road will you still have 12 cars on the
road if you count the white before the red and add the black last?
Absolutely, again discuss why.
Driving through the country, you can count cows in the field and then
talk about how many legs that would make.
Six cows with four legs each – that’s 24 legs.
Life in General
In any store you can relate adding and subtracting to word problems by
discussing items in cart or on shelves and play adding and subtracting.
Explain that talking about problems is the same as reading a word
problem.
You can help your child find the functional relationship when buying more
than one of the same item. I need
10 cans of tuna. The store has them
on sale for 5 for $3.00. Discuss
how much 10 cans would cost – $3.00 plus $3.00 is $6.00.
Go further by asking your student to figure how much each can costs: 6
dollars divided by 10 cans.
In the Garden
Planting in the garden can lead to functional relationships.
Apply the above to rows of flowers or vegetables.
Eating cereal – the color of Crunch Berries, or fruit salad – watermelon
vs. strawberries…Algebra and Functions are present in virtually everything we
do…with a little creativity and a lot of discussion…you child can master real
life algebra situations that will carry into the walls of his or her classroom.
Cows in the Field
When you are driving by a field have your child count the cows.
Let’s say there are five cows…discuss if there are five cow and each have
four legs…how many legs would there be in all?
How about eyes? How many
eyes would five cows have if each cow has two eyes?
Measurement and Geometry
1st Grade:
Compare the length, weight, and volume of two or more objects by
using direct comparison or a nonstandard unit.
1st and 2nd Grade:
Tell time to the nearest half hour
and relate time to events (e.g., before/after, shorter/longer) – second to
all intervals of time
2nd Grade:
Measure the length of objects by iterating (repeating) a nonstandard
or standard unit. Measure the length of an object to the nearest inch and/
or centimeter.
2nd Grade:
Use different units to measure the
same object and predict whether the measure will be greater or smaller when
a different unit is used.
2nd Grade:
Describe and classify plane and solid geometric shapes (e.g., circle,
triangle, square, rectangle, sphere, pyramid, cube, rectangular prism)
according to the number and shape of faces, edges, and vertices.
2nd Grade:
Put shapes together and take them apart to form other shapes (e.g., two
congruent right triangles can be arranged to form a rectangle).
Keeping
Time
When baking or during homework time – or any other time a timer can be used –
have your student be “timer monitor”.
Have students watch the clock during a trip to the store and figure out
how much time it takes to get there and back.
Leave for school the same time every day and assign you student the
responsibility of knowing what time that is and of alerting you.
Write the time, in numbers, in a prominent place so she sees the number
written and can compare it to the clock.
Measure
it Out
Kids love playing with a retractable tape measure.
Give one to your child and let him go.
Equip him with a piece of paper and have him record his findings.
Talk about what he measured.
Are they things that will grow or shrink?
Label each one and measure them again another day.
Did they stay the same?
Notes