Complementry Math Resources for Elementary Students

Our schools are using both the "Everyday Math" and "Investigations" math programs with elementary students, both of which are constructivist in nature. A major complaint of parents with these programs is that students don't receive enough traditional practice in order to build automaticity of basic skills.

My question is this: What kinds of complementary math materials do you use with your students?

Tags: elementary, math

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Permalink Reply by R. Scott Young on May 9, 2009 at 6:51am

Feel free to use the math resources (or any of the subjects) on my web site. Everything is sorted by subject and topic and the hyperlinks are all graphical. Included are the Everyday Math demo games which are highlighted on their site. Enjoy!

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Permalink Reply by Marian Ponton on September 28, 2010 at 8:22pm

What a great collection of resources for all subject areas. The graphical hyperlinks are very appealing for our young students. Thanks for sharing!

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Permalink Reply by Lindsi on July 8, 2009 at 8:57am

That is a really cool site I added it to my delicious account do you mind if I use it as well with my students?

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Permalink Reply by Fran Riley on August 24, 2009 at 5:19am

Deanna,
You asked some great questions. We use Everyday Math in my district, too. The district opted for K-5 full adoption instead of phasing it in over two or three years. That first year was a nightmare for the upper grades. The students and parents were confused. They weren't familiar with the spiral and didn't have the benefit of using the program during the previous year(s) like you said. I teach first grade so the transition wasn't as hard for my students.
My school also has a transient population. Our new students struggle immensely with Everyday Math in the upper grades if they haven't been in the Everyday Math program. Parents get upset because it doesn't make sense to them. I would like to hear how other schools help the new students transition into Everyday Math,too.
When my colleagues and I looked at the program before implementing it, we had lots of questions. Once we started using the program, things started to make sense. It is hard to get everyone on board.
We have another problem. My district's current grading practice of using letter grades (A, B...) in grades 1-2 and numerical grades(92%-100% is A...) in grades 3-5 doesn't follow the Everyday Math-Beginning/Developing/Secure. How does your district report student progress?
Fran

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Permalink Reply by judy jacob on August 27, 2009 at 4:01am

Great site!!I am using http:// www.funnelbrain.com to teach my students in the class. I am going to suggest this to my colleagues too.

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Permalink Reply by Suzanne Cariddi on August 28, 2009 at 6:17am

We had been using "Everyday Math" in our school system for grades k - 8 but have now switched in the middle school (6-8) to the McGraw Hill Glencoe Series because of this problem. I am presently teaching 6th. It (Mcgraw Hill Glencoe) is much better and has great resources for use with my smartboard and an online textbook. As a teacher, most publishing company will send samples so you can consider changing the program.

If you cannot convince the school system to switch to a different book or if you don't want to do that, there are several other ideas I use for reinforcing practice. One way around all the everyday augmentation of practice sheets might be to develop some project based web assignments - if you are collaborating with grade-level colleages, you could spread the work around for creating several different projects which could run throughout the year. If not, start small and develop one project a year and build on it. Another possibility is to choose one day a week that is the "practice day" and do review games and reinforcemnt activity that day every week; students can create a list of sites/links which they have found to practice basic/fundamental math concepts.

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Permalink Reply by Darlene Wilborn on September 19, 2009 at 11:58am

Donna and Greg,

Thank you for sharing this site.
I am so happy to have found it. It will be shared with all teachers I know. We will start using it on Monday. This is a great place to have the students work on the math concepts at home and here at school.

Darlene

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Permalink Reply by GoldStudent on July 1, 2010 at 6:19am

Hello.
I would like to introduce to you our website: http://www.goldstudent.com/
It is an online math training program designed to help your children improve their problem-solving skills through continual practice drills, gain confidence in their math abilities with proven tools and have fun while they learn.
GoldStudent is dedicated to helping children excel in math!

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Permalink Reply by Lisa Hixson on July 2, 2010 at 3:14pm

Hi, Donna. Our district uses Everyday Mathematics, as well. Our parents are not comfortable with the ways it teaches students to add, subtract, multiply and divide. They feel that they cannot help them when they become stuck. I always teach the traditional methods and let my students decide which method they feel comfortable with. I am going to use Greg's resource he mentioned in his reply to you. I reviewed it and found it be very beneficial,

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Permalink Reply by Ajay Shroff on July 10, 2010 at 6:14am

Hi Donna,
You could use http://mobl21.com to easily create elearning content that can be accessed on Mobile phones and the desktop in less than 5 minutes. We have had teachers quickly build complementry content for their students. Contact me at ajay.shroff@emantras.com if you would like to find out more or if you have any questions :)
Ajay

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Permalink Reply by GoldStudent on June 20, 2011 at 7:05am

If you are thinking of giving your child some math during the summer, http://www.goldstudent.com/ can be a good tool for you. You can think of a way to reward them for the worksheets they complete. It is amazing how well a reward can help.

GoldStudent.com is a fun, easy and effective online math enrichment and assistance program for students K-6. It is designed to help children improve their problem-solving skills, gain confidence in their math abilities and have fun while they learn.

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