Hey Mama Monday: Math Is a Game to Master and It’s Fun, Mama!
Have you ever wondered “I don’t love math so how can I homeschool my child”? Believe me, you can do this! There are so many ways and means of teaching that even if you are not good at math, your child can be good at math! Math is my weak area. I can make it through teaching junior high math, but I obtain all the help I can to teach high school. I have found tons of help in the pages of The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine. (Nearly every issue talks about it!)
You can show your children that math can be exciting (even if you’re not feeling it) through learning the history of scientists and their mathematical discoveries. You can show them that math doesn’t have to be burdensome, but there are math uses in everyday life. You can even try teaching math through questions and conversations.
It doesn’t matter if you love it or hate it, there is always help. Here are ten tips for teaching math, and believe it or not, you can hate it and still be good at it.
Take the frustration out of math by using games and money and shopping trips and other hands-on math activities, as well as some tangible tools for teens to have success in math. Math can be multisensory, hands-on, and delicious.
If you are not confident in math, don’t fear! Just visit your local or state homeschool convention to see what’s available. You will be impressed and pleased to see how math curriculum is so teacher and student friendly these days!
Yes, there will be hard math days. But, the real joy of it all is that we have our own children in our own homes under our own care. Math can be done on comfy couches and outside in forts. No fuzzy math here. No Common Core math to struggle with. And, think of the freedom at our own little schools! Our kids are free to go to the kitchen without a permission slip and to the restroom without a hall pass. They are free to plant a garden in the spring, and they are free to paint a masterpiece or raise aquarium fish. They are free to go as far and fast as they can in math. Or, they are free to take it more slowly. They are free from bullies and fear. In our schools, we are free to speak about the mighty wonders of God when we sit in the house, when we walk by the way, when we lie down, and when we rise up (Deut. 6:4-7). Our children are free to sing praises in the living room and dance in the dining room, free to laugh in the hallways and pray in the bedrooms. They are free to be Home Where They Belong.
Praising God for freedom, and even math!
~Deborah
Deborah Wuehler is the Senior Editor and Director of Production here at The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine. She would say she is a very ordinary homeschool mom–with one exception: she has an extraordinary God Who provides all she needs for life and homeschooling. She has eight children aged 11 to 29. Deborah’s mission is this: to point other homeschoolers to the Lord in all they do, think, and feel—and to confirm that they, too, can find everything they need for life, godliness, and homeschooling in their knowledge of Him (2 Peter 1:3-4).
