Card Smarts

Have your children sharpen their math skills even more.

What you'll need

Pack of cards

Paper

Pencil

What to do


1. How many numbers can we make? Give each player a piece of paper and a pencil. Using the cards from 1 (ace)-9, deal 4 cards out with the numbers showing. Using all four cards and a choice of any combination of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, have each player see how many different answers a person can get in 5 minutes. Players get one point for each answer. For example, suppose the cards drawn are 4, 8, 9, and 2.
2. What numbers can be made?

4 + 9 + 8 + 2 = 23

4 + 9 - (8 + 2) = 3

(8 - 4) x (9 - 2) = 28

(9 - 8) x (4 - 2) = 2

2. Make the most of it. This game is played with cards from 1 (ace) to 9. Each player alternates drawing one card at a time, trying to create the largest 5-digit number possible. As the cards are drawn, each player puts the cards down in their "place" (ten thousands, thousands, hundreds, tens, ones) with the numbers showing. One round goes until each player has 6 cards. At that point, each player chooses one card to throw out to make the largest 5-digit number possible.

3. Fraction fun. This game is played with cards 1 (ace)-10, and 2 players. Each player receives one-half of the cards. Player’s turn over 2 cards each at the same time. Each player tries to make the largest fraction by putting the 2 cards together. The players compare their fractions to see whose is larger. For example, if you are given a 3 and a 5, the fraction 3/5 would be made; if the other person is given a 2 and an 8, the fraction is 2/8. Which is larger? The larger fraction takes all cards and play continues until one player has all the cards.

Players can develop strategies for using their cards, and this is where the math skills come in.

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Problem Solvers

These games involve problem solving, computation, understanding number values, and chance.

What you'll need

Pack of cards

Paper

Pencil

What to do


1. Super sums. Each player should write the numbers 1-12 on a piece of paper. The object of the game is to be the first one to cross off all the numbers on this list.

Use only the cards 1-6 in every suit (hearts, clubs, spades, diamonds). Each player picks two cards and adds up the numbers on them. The players can choose to mark off the numbers on the list by using the total value or crossing off two or three numbers that make that value. For example, if the player picks a 5 and a 6, the player can choose to cross out 11, or 5 and 6, or 7 and 4, or 8 and 3, or 9 and 2, or 10 and 1, or 1, 2, and 8.

2. Make 100. Take out all the cards from the pack except ace to 6. Each player draws 8 cards from the pack. Each player decides whether to use a card in the tens place or the ones place so that the numbers total as close to 100 as possible without going over. For example, if a player draws two 1s (aces), a 2, a 5, two 3s, a 4, and a 6, he can choose to use the numerals in the following way:

30, 40, 10, 5, 6, 1, 3, 2. This adds up to 97.

These games help children develop different ways to see and work with numbers by using them in different combinations to achieve a goal.

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More or Less

Playing cards is a fun way for children to use numbers.

What you'll need

Coin

2 packs of cards

Paper to keep score

What to do


1. Flip a coin to tell if the winner of this game will be the person with "more" (a greater value card) or "less" (a smaller value card).

2. Remove all court cards (jacks, queens, and kings) and divide the remaining cards in the stack between the two players.

3. Place the cards face down. Each player turns over one card and compares: Is mine more or less? How many more? How many less?

This game for young children encourages number sense and helps them learn about the relationships of numbers (more or less) and about adding and subtracting. By counting the shapes on the cards and looking at the printed numbers on the card, they can learn to relate the number of objects to the numeral.

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Picture Puzzle

Using symbols to stand for numbers can help make math fun and easier for young children to understand.

What you'll need

Paper

Pencil

Crayons

What to do


1. Choose some symbols that your child can easily draw to stand for 1s and 10s (if your child is older, include 100s and 1,000s).

A face could 10s, and a bow could be 1s.

2. List some numbers and have your child depict them.

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Important Things To Know

It is highly likely that when you studied math, you were expected to complete lots of problems accurately and quickly. There was only one-way to arrive at your answers, and it was believed that the best way to improve math ability was to do more problems and to do them fast. Today, the focus is less on the quantity of memorized problems, and more on understanding the concepts and applying thinking skills to arrive at an answer. To develop "transferable skills".

Wrong Answers Can Help!

While accuracy is always important, a wrong answer may help you and your child discover what your child may not understand. You might find some of these thoughts helpful when thinking about wrong answers.

Above all be patient. All children want to succeed. They don't want red marks or incorrect answers. They want to be proud and to make you and the teacher proud. So, the wrong answer tells you to look further, to ask questions, and to see what the wrong answer is saying about the child's understanding.

Sometimes, the wrong answer to a problem might be because the child thinks the problem is asking another question. For example, when children see the problem 4 + ___ = 9, they often respond with an answer of 13. That is because they think the problem is asking, What is 4 + 9?", instead of "4 plus what missing amount equals 9?"

Ask your child to explain how the problem was solved. The response might help you discover if your child needs help with the procedures, the number facts, or the concepts involved.

You may have learned something the teacher might find helpful. A short note or call will alert the teacher to possible ways of helping your child.

Help your children be risk takers: help them see the value of examining a wrong answer; assure them that the right answers will come with proper understanding.

Problems Can Be Solved Different Ways
Through the years, we have learned that while problems in math may have only one solution, there may be many ways to get the right answer. When working on math problems with your child, ask, "Could you tell me how you got that answer?" Your child's way might be different than yours. If the answer is correct and the strategy or way of solving it has worked, it is a great alternative. By encouraging children to talk about what they are thinking, we help them to become stronger mathematicians and independent thinkers.

Doing math in Your Head is Important

Have you ever noticed that today very few people take their pencil and paper out to solve problems in the grocery, fast food, or department store or in the office? Instead, most people estimate in their heads.

Calculators and computers demand that people put in the correct information and that they know if the answers are reasonable. Usually people look at the answer to determine if it makes sense, applying the math in their heads to the problem. This, then, is the reason why doing math in their heads is so important to our children as they enter the 21st century.

You can help your child become a stronger mathematician by trying some of these ideas to foster mental math skills:

1. Help children do mental math with lots of small numbers in their heads until they develop quick and accurate responses. Questions such as, "If I have 4 cups, and I need 7, how many more do I need?" or "If I need 12 drinks for the class, how many packages of 3 drinks will I need to buy?"

2. Encourage your child to estimate the answer. When estimating, try to use numbers to make it easy to solve problems quickly in your head to determine a reasonable answer. For example, when figuring 18 plus 29, an easy way to get a "close" answer is to think about 20 + 30, or 50.

3. As explained earlier, allow your children to use strategies that make sense to them.

4. Ask often, "Is your answer reasonable?" Is it reasonable that I added 17 and 35 and got 367? Why? Why not?

What Jobs Require math?

All jobs need math in one way or another. From the simplest thought of how long it will take to get to work to determining how much weight a bridge can hold, all jobs require math.

If you took a survey, you would find that everyone uses math: the schoolteacher, the cook, the doctor, the petrol station attendant, the solicitor, the housewife, and the painter.


Math in the Home

This section provides the opportunity to use games and activities at home to explore math with your child. The activities are intended to be fun and inviting, using household items.

Remember,

* This is an opportunity for you and your child to "talk math," that is to communicate about math while investigating relationships.

* If something is too difficult, choose an easier activity or skip it until your child is older.

* Have fun!

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LEARN MATH BASIC

You may have noticed that we are talking about "mathematics" -- the subject that incorporates numbers, shapes, patterns, estimation, and measurement, and the concepts that relate to them. You probably remember studying "arithmetic" -- adding, subtracting, multiplying, and dividing -- when you were in primary school. Now, children are starting right away to learn about the broad ideas associated with math, including problem solving, communicating mathematically, and reasoning.

Teachers are nursery schools are building bar graphs of birthday cakes to show which month has the most birthdays for the most children in the class. Pizzas or cakes can be used to learn fractions, and measurements can be taken using items other than rulers.

What Does It Mean To

* Be a Problem Solver,

* Communicate Mathematically, and

* Demonstrate Reasoning Ability?

A problem solver is someone who questions, investigates, and explores solutions to problems; demonstrates the ability to stick with a problem for days, if necessary, to find a workable solution; uses different strategies to arrive at an answer; considers many different answers as possibilities; and applies math to everyday situations and uses it successfully.

To communicate mathematically means to use words or mathematical symbols to explain real life; to talk about how you arrived at an answer; to listen to others' ways of thinking and perhaps alter their thinking; to use pictures to explain something; to write about math, not just give an answer.

To demonstrate reasoning ability is to justify and explain one's thinking about math; to think logically and be able to explain similarities and differences about things and make choices based on those differences; and to think about relationships between things and talk about them.


How Do I Use this Book?

This book is divided into introductory material that explains the basic principles behind the current approach to math, and sections on activities you can do with your children. The activities take place in three locations: the home, the supermarket, and in transit.

The activities are arranged at increasingly harder levels of difficulty. The ones you choose and the level of difficulty really depend on your child's ability. If your child seems ready, you might want to go straight to the most difficult ones.

Each activity page contains the answer or a simple explanation of the mathematical concept behind the activity so that you can explain when your child asks, "Why are we doing this?"

With these few signs to follow along the way, your math journey begins.

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WRITE AND TALK, TOO

While reading with your child is most important, there are other activities that help to get children ready to read. With a solid foundation, your child will not only read, but will read with enthusiasm.

Learning to read is part of learning language. It's like leaning to catch a ball. The child must learn to watch the ball when it is thrown, to step into it, and to place their hands to make the catch. It's a single event made up of three acts. After a while they learn to do all three at once.


The same is true of learning language. When we use language, we speak words out loud, we read words on paper, and we write. This section has activities that encourage your child to

* Speak

* Read

* Write

* Listen

Begin long before you expect your child actually to read, and continue long after your child is an independent reader.

Now, turn the page and start enjoying language.

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