Demystifying Elementary Math (from a Secondary Perspective)

Subtraction - Take Aways - Whatever you call it this is the first "big" hurdle for many students in a long race of mathematics. It turns out that this first hurdle is often the first time parents seem to get beyond frustrated with the MANY ways students are presented with solving a subtraction problem. All of the skills you'll see in this video are essentially shortcuts that many discover on their own through mental math and practice. By presenting them to students at a young age they become more and more comfortable with numbers and their reasoning and number sense improves overall.  Enjoy!

If you watched my first multiplication video ( here if you haven't yet), you'll remember that I said there was a high school application for the area model strategy of multiplying.  We're going to take a look at that today.  Since many parents are currently in this situation trying to recall what they can remember about high school math.  For many parents, who do remember factoring quadratics from their high school algebra days, it probably wasn't their favorite memory.  I would bet that most people factored using the tried and true "guess and check" strategy - which works great IF you have a really strong handle on your multiplication facts.  If not, students struggled and were likely told that "upper level math" just may not be for them. When in reality, many of those struggling students struggle because they need to SEE WHY something works.  When we connect multiplying (FOIL if that rings any bells) to factoring in 1 cohesive proces...

To answer the title question - a LOT! We take for granted that most of us adults can add quickly because we "know our math facts".  For many of us that may be true, but I would bet that the vast majority of adults out there do quite a few of the addition strategies your children are taught in elementary school without even knowing it! This video addresses some of the addition strategies that I've seen frustrating parents.  Addition Video As always, let me know if there's a topic you'd like to see Demystified! 

More than anything, I want to help parents see that the "new" methods they're seeing their students work on during this virtual schooling stint isn't all that new and it's definitely not scary.   The first topic I'll tackle is this meme:  I HATE these kinds of things. But this one in particular really grates on my nerves since this very strategy is SO helpful in Algebra 1 (pretty much my favorite course to teach of ALL the high school courses).  Check out my explanation here: Demystifying Elementary Math Video 1   So in the end, be patient. I promise your student WILL learn all the strategies you learned "back in the day" too - but they'll also be building number sense and reasoning skills alongside their math skills.  Got a topic you want Demystified? Shoot me an e-mail at MrsLeighMath@gmail.com