Creative Homeschooling: Math

Posted by AmyStults | 0 comments

Counting Money
If your husband often comes home from work with spare change in his pocket, use this as an opportunity to teach your child to count money. If they can correctly count the change, they can put it in their piggy bank. Once they master counting the coins, alter the rules: they can have the change if they can correctly add the amount to what is already in their piggy bank. You can keep a tally on a piece of paper or white board.

Skip Counting
For most kids, skip counting by 2’s and 5’s is a cinch. But let’s face it, sometimes even us adults stumble on skip counting by numbers like 6 and 7. There are many CD’s available that teach skip counting to music, but here is a free and extremely giggly way to practice your skip counting while making your child feel appreciated and loved.

Me: I love you more than 6 cookies
Him: Well, I love you more than 12 PB&J’s
Me: I love you more than 18 pizzas
Him: I love you more than 24 ice cream cones
Me: Well, I love you more than 30 pieces of cheese!
Him: Wow, you really love me!! I love you more than 36 Magic Tree House books
Me: And I love you more than 42 bags of chips.
…and so on

Breaking the Code
Get rid of those boring math worksheets! This is an exciting way to practice those math problems.

1. Use assigned number values for each letter of the alphabet (print sheet)



2. Write your child a message or joke, using addition, subtraction, multiplication or division problems instead of letters. It is up to your child to complete the math problems in order to solve the message. Here is an example:

Question: What happens when you tell an egg a joke?

Answer: It cracks up

Math War
Teach your child to play the classic card game War. After a while, change the rules so that instead of one card, you must play 2 cards and add up the total to see whose amount is higher. For example: I lay down a 4 and 7 and my son lays down a 2 and 10. 12 beats 11 so he wins the hand!

More Math War
Play the game the regular way, with one card each, however this time the winner of the hand must recite the multiplication fact before they can truly win the hand. For example: I lay down a 4 and he lays down a 7. His card is higher but he cannot win the hand unless he can give the answer to 4×7.

Amy is a devoted wife to her husband of 11 years, a Classical homeschooling mom to a seven-year-old Superhero and the co-founder of Heart of the Matter and A Woman Inspired Ministries. She has a passion for genealogy and is aspiring to be a Proverbs 31 lady. Be sure to visit her blog at Milk and Cookies.