First off, a big thank you to everyone who attended math night! It was super fun and hopefully got everyone excited about math! If you did not attend you missed some important information: math homework will be changing for 4th grade. Instead of assigning IXL or paper homework, the homework expectations from now until the end of the year will be to practice math facts each school night for 20 minutes. Each student has a log that they are responsible for bringing to and from school everyday. It will be checked daily and if they do not practice or forget their log, they will be going to study hall.
At math night we discuss some different strategies for practicing math facts. Here is a quick overview of what we discussed:
Math Night Information
Time requirements per 50 facts:
- 3rd grade- 2 minutes and 30 seconds
- 4th grade- 2 minutes
- 5th grade- 1 minute and 45 seconds
Ways to practice math facts:
- Using a plastic sleeve and a math fact page, time the facts written with dry erase/vis-a-vis markers. Math fact pages can be found at www.math-drills.com
- Flash cards
- Make two piles, the known pile that is answered within 3 seconds and the unknown pile that takes longer than 3 seconds and practice the unknown pile
- Sandwich- take the unknown pile and the known pile and stack them with 3 knowns and 1 unknown, then three more knowns and 1 unknown.
- Apps
- Math fact master
- Math magician
- IXL math facts (found under third grade)
- Manipulatives
- Dice- roll two dice and multiply them. Or if working on a specific fact, take that number and multiply it by the number rolled on the dice. Writing a list of the facts solved on a whiteboard or paper as they go is a good way to keep track of work!
- Cards- same as dice
- Dominoes- grab a domino and multiply the two sides or two dominoes and multiply together.
If your child is unsure which math facts they have passed (hopefully they know as they are keeping a log and graphing their progress in class) feel free to e-mail me and I can tell you which facts they need to complete.
Thanks and have a wonderful week!
