school math dilema

Oh goodness, that is the kind of thing that makes me crazy! Math of all subjects needs to be driven by assessment!!! Ask them to do a criterion referenced assessment like the Brigance to see her skill levels in math. Make them prove to you that they are working on skills SHE needs, not just a sampling of grade level material just for exposure! That is crazy! And if that is the regular ed. math program they are using, what grade level is it? I would point out that she is in pull-out math because she is behind, and she needs the skills taught in sequence at her specific level. Get the specific skills written on her IEP if they are not already.

And one more thing. It is not good for her to be working in 3 different programs at the same time. Your husband should be doing the practice work from MUS with her.

Agree 100 percent with Janis, although parallelling two programs is often a good idea (twice the practice and sometimes a different view). Exposure in math is tidiculous; just leads to fear and frustration.
As far as the fraction sheet homework, here is a method: just don’t do it. Send a note to the teacher saying your daughter has not yet been taught this material and does not know how to do it, so you are not wasting your time doing the sheet for her. Stick to your guns on this. Sure they can hand out lots of F’s, but what can they *really* do to you or to her? After enough not-done sheets, they will have to re-think their approach. Doing the sheets would just convince them that they are doing the right thing and it is succeeding, so don’t go down that road.

Absolutely! Great advice about the math sheet! I have done that a couple of times when my own child brought home an inappropriate math worksheet, and she is not LD in math!

Well now the teacher has contacted me saying that she will be creating materials for the class at the early 3rd grade level and if she sees they comprehend that, then will increase difficulty level. On the WIAT II she scored 5.8 math reasoning and 3.8 numerical operations. So isn’t this stepping too far back? She was doing fine getting As & Bs in the Saxon 54.

*Temproraily*, for *short-term* upgrading, stepping well back is a good thing. I do this with my tutoring students; start off at a level they have mastered and then move up. Success breeds success, and in math particularly one little missed thing at an earlier level can casue chaos two or three years doen the road, so this can be a good thing to do.

My only red flag is that she is doing this for the whole group. Is the group going to be held to the pace of the slowest learner? That is a problem in all groups and in special ed it may mean no progress at all.
Nothing wrong with reviewing Grade 3 work — but it should be *review*, and finished in a month, if she was really succeeding in 4-5 work previously. If they just seem to be going around and around the same treadmill, this is a problem.

You can speak to the teacher about goals and differentiating and see where this is supposed to be going.

I”d let the teacher do *whatever*… and carry on your own program.

“Too far back” will be review, and IMO it is difficult to have too much of that. “Exposure” to new stuff is far, far more harmful.

Thanks for all the input. Teacher decided to do 4th grade level and see how it goes. With the worksheet she gave us on fractions my daughter did ok, but didn’t understand the concept that 4/8 was the same as 1/2. She was to color 1/2 of a circle that was divided into 8 parts. My husband went over reducing fractions again with her and I sent an e-mail explaining she may need help with that concept.They have been working on making miniture kites for the past 3 days and then the teacher will delve into fractions again.

A supplemental program that might be helpful is the “Key To Fractions” set of workbooks. These are available from many sources. One of them is http://www.rainbowresource.com. These are quite well-done in terms of both explaining how to do things and providing practice. (I am thinking especially of the fraction equivalents you mentioned, but they have a lot more.)

Another approach for fractions that I have used and liked is the book by Marilyn Burns titled “Lessons in Introducing Fractions”. This is available from Amazon. Although designed for classroom use, it is pretty easy to adapt to one-on-one. One of the great things about this book is that it starts out by having both the student and the teacher make their own sets of manipulatives (for use in the games in later lessons). This, plus the games, really helps a child take ownership of the concepts being taught.

Nancy

I have used Marilyn Burn’s book with my LD son and I like it a lot. One of the therapists I have worked with told me that fractions require visualization while a lot of math can be done by rote, relying on memory. (I know I got through graduate school statistics even that way—until I had a teacher who gave essay stat exams!)

This book helped my son as did lots of repetition. He is doing fractions for the fourth time and I finally see that he can do simple things like reduce 2/4 to 1/2 in his head.

Beth

I really like Marilyn Burns’ books, though sometimes they have a lot of language for my very dyslexic students. She does an excellent job of building real understanding and application of the concepts.