By Michelle Ebersbach at December 16 2018 09:07:51
From a teacher's perspective our competition is tough. Passing out a handout of 30 problems that are all in a format of 534x25= is not as stimulating in the students' eyes as playing games such as Grand Theft Auto and Resident Evil.
Once you have a scope and sequence book, make a list of each area in math that he needs to work on for the school year. For example for grades three and four, by the end of the year in subtraction, your child should be able to:
Granted, that will always be a tough uphill battle for math to win out over most video games, but the point is, students today are much more immersed in technology than ever before. So even if you need to pass out a math worksheet to review concepts and formulas, it will greatly benefit your cause if you design the worksheet to be as stimulating as possible.
Point is, whatever it takes to get students actively involved with the reviewing process where they are not bored and effectively reviewing grade level material in order to prepare them for state or quarterly assessments.
As a middle-school math teacher, I have seen many students who do understand abstract concepts, and even enjoy learning about things like Pi and the Pythagorean Theorem, but who appear to be unable to do so due to a weak grasp of math fundamentals.
My students are engaged in the activity because they are always eager to find out what the next scene will be, and how the math problems will be nestled within. They also like how within each handout I inscribe the title in a way that fits with the theme of that particular scene - another attention catching technique. And since this review activity only takes about fifteen minutes of class time, it is quick yet extremely beneficial.