Maths ~ Options We've Used from Age 6 to the End of Highschool

I often get asked what we've used for maths with Jay and Daisy.  (We use this spelling of "maths" because we're British-based spellers :-) )
Though I've written a post focusing on the highschool maths options we were using,  I thought I'd back up and start from our primary school years and then include all the highschool level options Jay has used, in this post.

My purpose, not only with maths, has always been to find the tools that met the need of each child, and as they both have such different strengths, and learning styles, we've tried to customise our choices to suit them personally.  I didn't expect, or require, Daisy to try and follow along in the maths path Jay and I were creating for him.

During the younger years of maths discovery we used many !!
hands on tools (puzzles, manipulatives,  games - lots of games.)
real life maths applications (cooking, shopping, measuring and cutting etc) ,
living math books,

and, maths Dvd's like Singapore Maths & Mathtacular (though we weren't fussed on #4 in that series!).

I'll list a few of the less obvious board games that we've enjoyed using over the years. Chess, Domino's, Battle Ships, Bingo, Matching cards,  Monopoly, and most dice involved games, are what I classify as obvious maths games :)

Younger Years Maths Exploration

Youngers & Middles

Wedgits
Create a Critter (science) (math)

Colorku Suduko (math)
Mathsmaster  (interactive game books)

Think it Through (Discovery Toys) (math/phonics)

Marbles & Marble Mat (math) (hand-eye coordination)

Perfection (math) (hand-eye coordination)

Dino Math Tracks

Aunty Pasta Fractions
The Shopping Game

Puzzlesum

Thinkfun (puzzle) Games

Older

The NZ Investment Game

All Ages

Resort  (geog) (math)

Scotland Yard (math)

Getaway (geog) (math)

Connect Four Advanced

Some maths tools we've used over the years

We're still using games, real life maths  (there is always so much happening here, with all the projects the children are doing or helping with) and living maths literature in our highschooling years, though obviously at a much higher level.

Another higher schooling math application/option, that kiwimum recommended we try - excellent suggestion - was to focus on just doing the maths portions inside Apologia's Chemistry texts.  Jay is happy to use a science text this way, as a maths tool;  yet, he remains science text, with experiments, resistant.

With 'formal' maths curriculum we've taken a slightly different route to most, here it is:

Jay

1: Singapore Maths (only up to book 3b),  &, Miquon
2: Making Math Meaningful, and, Life of Fred (and lots of discovery maths tools)
3: Teaching Textbooks 
(Used TT for  6 months; the program was a resounding flop for him!)
4: Art of Problem Solving 
(this series is excellent; but Jay found the writing style in the texts were too long winded for him.  He used to say, "I liked maths, but not that much."  ;-) ) so we switched to....
5: Khan Academy & Life of Fred 
(he's completed all the LOF books we have. We don't have, nor will we be purchasing LoF Calculus... the story line is yuck!)  Khan & LoF were  a really good fit for Jay, yet once I ran out of LoF books for him to use Khan became a bit too 'random' for me to use as a stand alone maths tool for him, and Jay would get seriously distracted by other stuff on the site so we decided to move to...)
6: IXL      
During a year of sickness with one of our family I elected to switch him to something I didn’t have to “think” about monitoring so much.

(2015)  And IXL , along with maths literature and real life maths, is where he still is, and enjoying it.  He will refer to Khan for assistance, but doesn’t spend his maths time there.  He's reading through some of the LOF texts again as review, and for the fun factor.

Jay is only a year away from completing all the levels of math we are wanting him to go through; then we're not sure what he'll do - so many options! 

7:  (2016) He completed his last year of prescribed Maths using NCEA Mathematics Standards via The New Zealand Correspondence School.    Those who know us in real life will have heard of Jay's opinion on 'getting' Maths done this way :-D
8: (2017) Jay has now moved into Accounting  Finance and Business related topics as his Maths focus for this year.
8: (2018) Absolutely completed formal schooling.  Jay is doing delight led studies along with working with Dn (part-time) building a home on our lifestyle section. (Big job!)

Real Life Maths:  One of the projects Jay has worked on.

Daisy

1: Miquon and small amounts of Singapore Maths
(she needed extra visual and tactile, discovery type, tools.  So I incorporated Mathtacular Dvd’s, lots of maths games, Singapore Maths Dvd’s, Applied (real life) maths.  I entertained using Developmental Math with her, but after comparing curriculums, and praying, we then went with:
2: Making Math Meaningful    

One of Daisy's choice of Maths Manipulatives to use with MMM

She stopped a little before book 5 and we switched her to just using  Life of Fred and Khan Academy for instruction.  Daisy is not a maths intuitive student, as some students are,  she requires clear in-depth instruction that obviously caters to her learning style; which includes an organised, systematic, teaching buddy along with discovery styled forms of instruction (visual/tactile.  ie: in the increasing levels in maths acumen using colouring in maths diagrams for things like percentages works really well too).  While she was using these 2 maths tools I was not able to be that teaching buddy/ maths topic co-ordinator, due to that year of sickness with one of our family members, so she asked to have a go on:
3: IXL   
She did okay with this but long term needed more visual instruction than IXL gives.   IXL is designed for practice, and does not give indepth instruction with a selection of examples.  I thought of adding in some Key To books, but she was keen to have an instructor ;) ). So we've moved  her to: 
4: CTC Math  (Mathbuddy)
(US equivalent ofMathbuddy;  we  may switch to MB once our CTC subscription expires.)  
CTC is an excellent fit for her as it comes with an instructor who uses visual diagrams, teaches thoroughly & clearly, and the instructor has an Australian accent; which is much more user friendly for us to listen to than some of the other overseas instructors we've previewed :D

Along with CTC Math, Daisy is also going through Life of Fred for review, not as her leading maths tool.
(2016 update) Daisy has a few more years of Maths to complete yet and I'll come back and update as we go along
(2017)  Daisy used CTC Maths only- great fit for her.  Lots of Real Life Math happening, crafts & projects. 
(2018)  She completed her first year of prescribed Maths using NCEA Mathematics Standards via The New Zealand Correspondence School.  (NCEA is set up for people that do better with bookwork.  Sophie did really well, considering she does NOT like bookwork).  Her previous years of Maths reall helped with Computer/Digital Studies this year.  Lots of Real Life Math happening, crafts & projects. 
(2019) updating when we get there.

Practical, Real life Maths

Jay and Daisy both really enjoy maths based literature ;) and have devoured books like Murderous Maths (these are not!!! christian books & I recommend that the parents know the content of these books before handing them over to your students) , and any other books with maths tricks in.   These type of books helped their maths acumen so much.

If you are interested to read through other posts about our maths journey, click on the label Math to the right.

Teaching extras I've used to assist the children as we've gone along:
1:  Miquon Diary & the Miquon Yahoo Group
2:  Family Math ~ Stenmark
3:  Creative Homeschooling: A Resource Guide for Smart Families ~ Rivero
4:  Bill Handley's items (ie: Speed Mathematics etc..), mostly used these with Jay
5:  Khan Academy ;)
6:  Dr. Wright's Kitchen Table Math 
This is an excellent series for mums to increase their own skill base in "teaching" math .  I highly recommend this series of books.
7:  The Great Courses:  Math Courses, beneath. (Great as fast refresher courses for me)
DO wait until TCG is having one of their mega sales before purchasing!  The standard list prices are crazy!
  Mastering the Fundamentals of Mathematics ~ Prof. Sellars
  Algebra I, &, Algebra II (set) ~ Prof. Sellars
  Secrets of Mental Math ~ Pro. Benjamin

Living Math Books ~ During the Younger Years

I'm slightly ;) missing in blogging action this week, yet I thought I'd toss up this quick post anyway.

Living Math Books   from Living Books Library
They've listed some titles we've not seen before, and so in the spirit of sharing I'll add two of our top math help books.  These are not on Living Books Library list, but we've found them so help filled during our family's younger math years:
Life of Fred
Family Math
Kitchen Table Math (this series is for mum to read and implement)
Here's a link to an older post detailing some other math based literature books we've used and enjoyed.

Math Buddy is 60% off for Homeschoolers (CTC NZ Math Equivalent)

**Scroll down for the NZ Math Buddy link and their offer to homeschoolers.
ETA: This is not an affiliate run post - just a 'heads up' post for my fellow home educators.

We are currently using CTC Math as Daisy's math choice for this year.  CTC offer homeschoolers 60% off, and then they gifted us with 6 extra months on top of that.  My homeschooling budget is very happy ♥
Better still, Daisy is enjoying using this program so far, an Australian voice is more user friendly for us than a U.S one would be; and, we needed to switch from IXL as there was just not enough instruction for her to grasp some of the concepts need for higher level math.

The only aspect neither of us are that fussed on is the checking system the program uses once a student has worked through the math problems.

The answers are listed at the bottom of each sheet in scrambled format, more answers than problems to solve,  and they have a letter from A-Z beside them - you match the answers with the the A-Z selection at the bottom of the worksheet and then key them into CTC to see if you have answered the questions correctly.  It's a small bug-bear but is something that could make a difficult math session, for us, feel even more difficult.

The good news is the NZ equivalent of CTC,
Math Buddy is also available to NZ homeschoolers at 60% off the screen price.  I inquired and received this reply  (ETA: see the comments section, for the update , 2017, concerning homeschoolers):

Thank you for your email regarding our home school program. Chelle, we do have a homeschooling discount available to your family and any other homeschooling families (so please let them know).

All subscribers to Maths Buddy who are registered as a home educator are entitled to a 60% discount. All we ask is that you email us documentation supporting that you are a home educator within the next month.

The discount is actually 60%, so the $397 family yearly rate is priced at $158.80 for homeschoolers. A single student yearly (normally $297) is $118.80.

Family membership is automatically set to 3 students but many people will want to increase that number so that all the family members get it. It’s that's easy - just shoot an email to us after registering and we will change it right away. There is no extra charge for this.

Chelle, the membership is for a calendar year.

To get the 60% discount, take out an offline subscription at http://www.mathsbuddy.co.nz/purchase.html, after your name please put in (Homeschool).  Once we received the details of your subscription, we will send the necessary information to proceed with the payment.

Highschool Level Math Options ~ What's Worked for Us

Erin From The Usual Mayhem created a post, a good while back now , about 5 Affordable Math Options for Highschool which got me thinking about the math tools that have been affordable, and used with success in our home.
(I've finally got around to dusting the 'draft' mode off  this post and posting it.)

An affordable math course is not always synonymous with a successful math course in our home :/  I've purchased some courses that were affordable, money wise,  yet they worked out costing us more long term, both in wasted time and dollars spent, since the text, or tutor,  just did not teach the best way for my students to learn and retain the information.  Amazingly those some flop-for-us math courses are another family's favourite .. so take my comments with that thought in mind; what works for us may be your absolute math flop of the year.

The options listed are the ones that we've used, and are still using, for our NZ highschool students.
A key point about curricula is that no matter how cost effective it may be, or good the course is, or how much the children and I like it  - the benefits can only be had when we actually knuckle down and use the teaching tools at our disposal.  ☺

1: Khan Academy: Algebra and Beyond
2: Life of Fred Highschool books
Update: I notice the LOF Calculus book is listed under the University Level and we don't have that book and after reading a review someone on TWTM gave on the content ... I think we might just skip it  :-/  (We did, the themes are pretty yucky)
3: IXL - NZ Math Curriculum yr 10-13  (good fit for Jay)
4: CTC Math  (good fit for Daisy.  We may switch to the NZ equivalent, Math Buddy, once our subscription is finished with CTC Math)
5: Real Life Math

Khan Academy: Algebra and Beyond , and,  Life of Fred Highschool books work as a successful combination in our home - and yes, ongoing involvement is required on my part to ensure that both Khan's online math course and LOF are being used to their full potential for each student. Just 'playing' on Khan,  and reading through the storyline of LOF books is not going to cut it as solid math tuition.

Part way through this year (2014), due to unforeseen circumstances, we needed to switch to a math course that was going to allow me to monitor what the children we're mastering, or not, from a less hands on stance so we signed up with IXL - NZ Math Curriculum yr 10-13 .  I was a little dubious at first as we've tried a computerised math text before, Teaching Textbooks - which was one of the  resounding flops (!) for the child I'd purchased it for - thankfully IXL is working with great success for us.   Others experience may differ.
UPDATE: I didn't intend, long term, to leave Daisy learning via IXL  as it has very little indepth instruction, and so had her learning via CTC Maths.

Real Life Math is key for us and one of the most affordable 'courses' we use - it's free;  just use the math techniques you've learnt, or learn it so you can use it.  This is also a good spot to see what math skills the children don't know yet or have not retained .
We try to ensure that the bulk of what the children are learning can be transferred over to use in real life practical application somewhere, at some point.
So shopping, building projects, sewing, cooking (includes catering for crowds) , working out trip/holiday costs, mixing up farm/yard sprays, importing goods from overseas,  raising and selling live stock, etc..   ensure that many of those math skills get put to work.
Mixing up the medicine for the turkey's, and the live stock,  the first few times takes some number crunching - just ask Jay and Dn ☺☺

Wondering if you have a highschool leveled math course, or approach, that is working in your home that you'd recommend to others?

Another Ancients Week- Starting 29th of July

Athens, Sparta , and Esther (week 23 on our Ancients schedule) were our bible and history focus topics for this week, which meant LOTS of reading.

Dn is reading Within the Palace Gates ~ Siviter to us and we’re all finding it a very intriguing read.
As I mentioned elsewhere, it does have some mature, and gritty, topics in it so I do recommend pre-reading before handing to over as a reader.

Our audio books (for Daisy and I to listen through together) was supposed to be Wanderings of Odysseus, but we all, Bobs included, got so distracted by our car time audio D’Aulaires Book of Greek Myths  that we haven't got to Odysseus  - amazingly our local library had D'Aulaires on C/D.
We now know where the saying 'bored to death' may have orginated from.
We have however covered some of the ground work to go with The Odysseus by watching some of these online clips - which will not be everyone's cup of tea (and not for those youngers Y).

We also alternated between all listening to the audio of Esther (kjv) in our own time, and then reading select portions together during ‘bible time’.

Bobs' prescribed reading was :

The Story of Mankind,  The Famous Men of Greece (Memoria Press), and he chose Kingfisher over Biblioplan's Companion Text and Glencoe World History

As an easy reader he's been reading through: The Lion in the Gateway: The Story of the Persian Wars ~ Mary Renault (which is oop and ridiculously priced on amazon!!)

Daisy’s line up was:
The Greeks ~ Burrell, our copy has had the unclothed Greeks 'dressed'  :) ...  she read some of the scheduled pages, yet after she saw the full colour paintings in The Famous Men of Greece book she keen to read that too.

Her current prescribed reader is; Theras and His Town ~ Snedeker (and we're using the separate booknotes from one of Sonlights discontinued Core G Instructor's Guides.)

A New Zealand born home educator, Kiwimum ☺,  introduced us to some wonderful math books published by The Art of Problem Solving and while I was browsing through their site I came across these books: Dr. Wright’s Kitchen Table Math (bks 1-3)  - and I've been reading through those for my own interest and benefit.

The Table Math books are excellent, and I am already seeing how I can incorporate some of the hands-on suggestions mentioned in book 3 into Daisy's math time.  I'm enjoying the way Dr. Wright presents things – very discovery based, and these books would have been an almost perfect follow on for our family after using, and enjoying,  Miquon Math!

28th May ~ Our Week Ahead

This was our line up for this week, and we've managed to achieve a good chunk of it:

Math 

Bobs: to work steadily through more of the Algebra course on Khan Academy.  He's doing really well with LOF, Advanced Algebra, so we'll continue with that.

On free-Friday, Bobs wants to go through some of Sal Khan's finance lectures... for fun.

Daisy: Continue to work through some more lessons in MMM, she'd rather just do her LOF, Goldfish, book but needs the extra computation practice MMM gives.  I've been switching her between some Khan courses and MMM - which seems to give her math time more sparkle.

She really enjoys Math-it and will use that on free-Friday.

Spelling

Daisy has 1 more lesson to complete in her AAS book, and Bobs has 3 in his. 
They are aiming to have those done tomorrow as mastered, and completed,  lesson books generate take out pizza for tea.

Grammar
(which ds calls Grandma because RnS has a very old fashioned flavour.)
Complete a lesson each day (4 each this week).
Both children like these grammar texts.

Writing With Skill
I think Bobs is doing very well with this writing curriculum, which he's dubbed Writing that Kills (Sorry Susan ☺) 
I wonder if perhaps some of the secret to the success for him is that we are purposely keeping the lesson times shorter, no more than 40 mins, and that seems to ensure that the writing he generates is "fresher".  We just stop if it looks like the lesson is going to become an epic one, he stops at a place that is comfortable for him to pick it up again, the next day.

Hymn
for the next 4 weeks: When the Roll is Called up Yonder

Composer
for the next 4 weeks: Antonin Dvorak
Unit 9 (1841-1904)

We're hoping, Daisy & I,  to camp down around some Russian Fairy Tales and Chinese Tales, I said Japanese somewhere else on the web ... those come later.

History
SOTW4 chapts 13 & 14
Builders of NZ pgs 128-131
(with our time focus being 1889-1896 and zeroing in on Russia and New Zealand)


SL books:
Mary Slessor SL5 (start)
Helen Keller R/A 3/4 (Daisy to complete)
The Terrible Wave R4 (Daisy - next reader .. might read this with her)
The Big Wave R5 (Bobs)

Tie-in Reader for Bobs: Helen Keller's Teacher

We should wrap up Maori and the Settler and then we have a few options to choose from.

Bobs is enjoying reading all the sequels to Wolves of Willoughby Chase (which is now a discontinued SL Core F title.  Thank goodness Susan Bauer includes lessons on it in Writing With Skill or I may have just ignored that book.)
It's nice to see him reading something other than non-fiction for free reading!!


Daisy's audio is The Wizard in Oz (again)
Her free reader (nearly finished) is Elsie at Roselands,  then she'll start Roller Skates (another discontinued SL title).

Our Week - Started 7 May 2012

We’re well into Autumn here and it’s the time of year when I like us to be working diligently through our schedule.
If one can not have delicious summer days then .......there is something lovely about reading books while sipping hot chocolate in front of the fire place.

Family Read Aloud
Maori and Settler ~ G.A. Henty
(This is a really interesting book!  And just loaded with indepth NZ history.)
Prescribed audio: Around the World in 80 Days.

Mum's Friday house cleaning listen ☺  is Karen Savage reading  The Elusive Pimpernel.  She's such a skilled reader, we've enjoyed a few free reads by her. 
Karay is another free reading favourite.
I'm always on the look out for good free reads.

Science/Nature
History Of Medicine ~ Tiner - SL Sci5
-The children are working through reading the next lesson in Apologia Human Anatomy.
-The last of our monarch butterflies has hatched and will be off to shelter somewhere.
-Our King Emperor moth has not emerged yet.
-The baby guinea pigs (cavies) are ready to go to their own homes (it's always hard to part with them, they are just so sweet).

Bobs Readers
Explorer the World of Mathematics ~ Tiner
John Paton: Sinking the Day Spring
Apologia Human Anatomy: Lesson 2
Lots of free reading titles

Daisy’s Readers
Elsie Dinsmore: Bk2   Elsie Holiday at Roselands
Apologia Human Anatomy: Lesson 2
LOTS!!!!!  of free reading titles.

Daisy listened to the first Elsie Dinsmore book on audio and really enjoyed it!  So she's picked up bk 2 in the series to enjoy as her next free reader.  I'm being gifted with    a.lot   of unprompted narration snippets ☺

World History
SOTW 4, Chapt 10: A Canal to the East and A Very Dry Desert
(no story of the world history outlines this week – it’s an NZ history focus moment for us.)

New Zealand History
Builders of New Zealand: NZ Depression (1880s) pgs 126-129
I wished they’d bring this book back into print!  It creates a spring board for some very indepth converations in our home. 

Math
Both: LOF, Khan Academy , and reading Murderous Maths

Bobs has just finished LOF Geometry and really wants to have a go with Advanced Algebra …. I was really thinking I may end up needing to give him a break away from LOF for a while.
I wondered if he’s ready for that book? 
I found him quietly sitting at the table today working through LOF Advanced Algebra (it's Friday, and we don't have regular math schedule for today. At all. Ever!)  
Got to love LOF ☺ 
I'll mark the work on Monday and see how he's done.
He’s proved me wrong a time or 4 before, with things I didn't think he was ready for, so we’ll see.

L/As
Bobs: WWS, RnS (grammar orally with mum), AAS rules
Daisy: WWE, RnS ( grammar some orally/some written), AAS

Switching to Rod and Staff has been a good move for our family. They enjoy doing the books orally with mum (they read the content aloud to me) the lessons are short and each child seems to inject their own humour into the lesson.

Art
No art this week. This aspect just seems to have fallen off our create a space - can do art
The children are currently building a "world' with all the old playmobil sets - it's all over the library lounge floor - which does make it hard to get to the book shelves, the couches, and the fire place .... a small price to pay for creativity.
Latin
Must do Visual Latin. (repeat to myself 10 times !!)

Music for the next month
Hymn: Pass me Not, O Gentle Saviour Saviour
Fanny Crosby’s Life and Music
Classical Composer: Tchaikovsky Unit 8 pg 31

Math - Change Around

Dn and I have had a change around in our math line up for Bobs.
Bobs has worked steadily, to around, 1/2 way through MMM: Principles from Patterns and found we were using Khan Academy more and more for the teaching videos to help us work through the problems in the MMM Algebra math text.
We've chosen to put MMM aside for a while and get Bobs to work through Khan Academy's videos and practice sessions and then perhaps reopen MMM and see how Bobs goes with David Quine's book.
The book is excellent, it is just a bit thin on detailed and ongoing instruction that, I feel, Bobs needs to cover some of the Algebraic processes.

So Bobs is a happy camper using Khan Academy, which has a points system for work completed, and he continues to delight in Life of Fred.
While we've used Khan Academy off and on for a few years, I haven't chosen to use the site as our main teaching component until now.
I'm feeling pretty contented too, having an "instructor" to assist me with higher level math again is very helpful. 
We tried math with an 'online instructor' before, using Teaching Textbooks,  and it was not a good fit for Bobs, yet Khan Academy seems to work.
The only down side to using Khan Academy with Bobs;  Daisy wants to switch over to that too ☺

Math in March

Bobs is enjoying the mix we use for math, Making Math Meaningful (David Quine) and Life of Fred.
Sometimes we hit a bump in the teaching road, or I need to do some study ahead to refesh myself on how a concept is taught and then Khan Academy is my best buddy.

Just thought I'd drop a refresher post in here about that excellent site, as others may forget about it as often as I used to. I don't forget it any more ☺

Both children are signed up with me as a coach. (It pays to make sure you set that side of Khan Academy up properly, with each student using a seperate email account (one of their own) to the one we "educators" will use to log on to Khan Academy, and then selecting yourself as the coach on each student's profile).

I set up a "dummy address" for myself, and Bobs, on gmail, and daisy is using my homeschooling email address.

Khan has a create a "galaxy" rewards system (learn to collect items) which both children appreciate!

Life of Fred and Making Math Meaningful

Jay is enjoying the Life of Fred books (he's encountered so far very much) and the first 2 books tie in so well with M.M.M level 6.

L.O.F is a wonderful incentive to make sure other, less palatable, learning tasks are done.
See these samples if you'd like to see inside L.O.F books.

Daisy gets enthralled by what Fred is up to next and wants Jay to 'work' the math part out so they can move on with the story.

They valiantly plowed through the first book far quicker than I wanted Jay (them) to so I quietly put the second book "out of reach" for a while since I wanted us to use it for study now - using portions of our M.M.M text for further practice where, or as, needed.

L.O.F books are a hit in our home .... I like reading them too - wish math had been this much fun when I went to school :-)

Math with Money #2

Math with Money #2

Just to save (me) some time I'll pop the pictures of our NZ money review in this spot. The pictures actually go with this post, which also includes the link to the blank sheets.

Math with Money - NZ Currency.

Math with Money - NZ Currency.

Daisy’s math for a few weeks has been money, and time, and since our text (Making Math Meaningful) is American - the dollars and cents work in there is just not going to cut it for us – no need to reinvent the wheel I’ve just taken a side step to work with our currency.

Here are the few sheets we threw together for review and placed over at HSlaunch:

Pages for Math using New Zealand Money . (We've included pictures in our next post.)

For those wanting to generate their own worksheets online you can do that at on line math.

Then just because we could: I pulled out the play money, drafted up a sheet in pencil with pictures for shopping time while Daisy got out the play cash registar ..... and math becomes “play” time; which is very distracting for Bobs :-)

It’s a little hard to computate la.oooooooooooooooooong division when your little sister is ka-chinging and rattling around with plastic money. It is to be noted however that they went on to make rather purchases well into the thousands, once Bobs abandoned his division drill.

The sheets we hand drew included basic money skills:

1: A dress cost $32.50. You gave the cashier $40.00, how much change did she give you?

(And Daisy would work the amount of change out with the play money - no writing involved here just all practical application).

Here's another: 2: You purchased an ice-cream for $2.30 and a bottle of water for $2.70. How much did you spend in total?

And etc… She enjoyed herself.

A link we used that may interest other kiwi’s too, was The Reserve Bank website .

If you start clicking around under the schools tab, located on the left hand side of their web page, you’ll find some extras that make good ‘go alongs’ for a unit on NZ money.

For those pressed for time: The direct link to the school projects page is here . And for teachers items, try here.

From their site we ordered some free booklets to read through about the history of NZ currency (very interesting) and a smaller wall size chart with details about our current currency.

Those items can be found on this page under Currency.

End of Year Learning ~ Part 2

End of Year Learning ~ Part 2

or,

Billy Bones Science and Gift Giving Math

With Bobbi: for his personal end of the year learning he's been very casually doing a few lessons in Teaching Textbooks & reading a good mix of math, science & history related books.

Along with listening to the dramatised audio bible he's been faithfully crafting his skeleton (Billy Bones) and just doing, well, boy sorts of things.... and counting the days, hours & minutes until Christmas day :)

Daisy: math became a gift-giving baking episode.
We sat down with the recipes for Daisy to work out on jotter paper the sums needed to double each recipe.
Then we set to baking ... Daisy had a wonderful time and the recipients of her math time we're rather pleased :-)

She's (& her marmee) enjoying listening to What Katie Did and What Katie Did at School and is continuing to read a mountain of books (!!) along with creating some lovely-mess-making crafts. Fun!

One of Daisy's delight directed projects was to create a piece of bone - to test the strength of our bones.
Here are the pictures - should anyone else want to have a go.