Every child gets excited when you hand them dry erase markers and a whiteboard. How fun it is to color something and then wipe it away only to do it again! I have found that using dry erase markers for different subjects in school brings an interesting, fun twist to mundane routine. I will often put away our typical handwriting books and pull out some dry erase handwriting templates I have stowed away just for some fun practice. I have not, however, done this with math before!

Math facts are often given a bad rep. They are associated with repetitious, mind-numbing memorization drills. This is a shame because it is math facts that are important and helpful in every life scenario. SuperFlash Math LLC created Addition & Subtraction Workshop that marries the fun of using whiteboard markers with learning basic math facts in an intriguing and impactful way.

Mary Jo Stewart is the author of Addition & Subtraction Workshopbecause of 30+ years of tutoring and homeschooling. She noted students’ frustration when it came to learning addition and subtraction facts. She tried to eliminate the frustration of students being slowed down by basic math facts with her method of learning.

All 121 basic addition and subtraction facts are laid out in nine sections in this flip-style workbook. A plastic overlay is supplied for dry erase markers to be used on each of the lesson’s pages. There are short lessons at the beginning of each section and then many varying exercises to expose the child to the math facts studied in each section. These exercises include, but are not limited to fill in the blanks, matching, speed tests, and number lines. The answers to each exercise are on the rear of the page. The plastic overlay can be removed and placed on the answer side to see if the child’s lines or answers match up.

I used this book with my 6-year old son. He knew nearly half of his math facts before starting this workbook so we used it to accompany the math curriculum he was currently using to reinforce his lessons and gain a new perspective on the same information. We drilled with this book daily for the last several weeks. I must say, I have never seen him so excited to do his math before! He wanted to do more pages and never wanted to put it away. He especially loved the timed exercises as he is competitive and thrived on trying to beat his previous score.

There were a few exercises that were a bit over my 6-year old’s head. One of them was adding 10 to higher numbers. Adding 10 seemed to be thrown into the mix of math facts near the beginning of the workbook. This lesson seemed out of place and too advanced for my son to understand. I especially think it is too early to introduce this concept at this point to a student learning math facts for the first time.

I believe that Addition & Subtraction Workshop could be used on its own as a math curriculum. Learning math facts is the most important foundation for math success and this workbook will do the trick turning the frustration and drudgery into amusement and anewfound confidence in math.

-Product review by Cassie Deputie, The Old Schoolhouse® Magazine, LLC, June 2020