Several months ago I started looking for something to use to teach my daughter math. I wasn’t sure what to use, and most of the options I was seeing were expensive. Since I only have one child, it’s not as if I could justify a very expensive math program by saying well I can reuse it with “each” of the children. So I needed something reasonable priced, I didn’t want dry facts or drills. Somehow I found my way to Queen’s Homeschool. There I found a rather new math program that seemed to be less drill and a more interesting way to learn math: Life of Fred. There are currently 10 books in the elementary series and then three books in the intermediate series before the Fractions (or the Pre-Algebra) series. (It’s not recommended normally to start Fractions until 10 years old or 5th grade on their website.) Its all in story format, told from the point of view of 5 year old Fred who is a Math Professor at Kitten’s University. It’s not dry facts, but everything is presented as Fred uses the concept. It’s not abstract but useful to Fred.
What I found was intriguing, I also liked the price compared to the other math curricula I was seeing. I decided that it couldn’t hurt to try it at least it. So with that in mind I ordered the first two books. Once they arrived we managed to wait until the next morning before starting them. Then we read the first two chapters, and my daughter loved it. She wanted to read more, and I could see that she’s be happy to read the entire book in a day or two if I let her. I had to set some rules, remember I only had purchased two of them so far. The first book has 18 chapters, with each chapter being a fairly quick, easy read. With only 13 books and 4 years to cover I figured I had to find a way to slow her down a bit. So we do a chapter 3 times a week, and then she has worksheets the other two days. The work sheets currently are time, money and addition based, which I print from Worksheet Works. All the things I want to her know with a glance rather than need to take extra time to figure out.
Why do worksheets if I want a Charlotte Mason style education and living books? Well, the Life of Fred books are “designed to my your child THINK! and learn on their own” but also “Dr. Schmidt believes that basic math facts can be taught in an informal way using games and flashcards” (which means the books teach you the concepts, not the dull memorization). Personally I don’t know what game will teach my daughter to read an analog clock at a glace, and flashcards never seemed to work for me. I know my daughter is not me and could have a different learning style, where flashcards could help, but they didn’t seem to help as much with her learning sight words. Also I find it easier to give her her maybe 10 – 20 problems total to solve in the form of a worksheet. We both seem to be happy with the results of that, and it’s good for her to practice writing her numbers. It allows me to see where her strengths in math are and what needs a bit more work yet. When I’m comfortable that she can answer all the questions quickly and correctly, I move on to more difficult problems and we’ll be moving to written subtraction problems in due time. (She can answer oral subtraction problems already especially in the “story” format.)