SLANT

I just saw this term “slant” in a magazine this morning. It was in an article on Brain Boosters for kids. This was under being ready to learn.

S—sit up
L-lean forward
A-activate your thinking and ask thoughtful questions
N-nod to show your teacher you understand
T-teach others so you’ll remember what you learned

On your daughter and multiplication—a lot of LD children have a very difficult time learning their multiplication tables. My son did. IT took us a whole year of work every day. His LD teacher was amazed—she told me she learned that LD kids can’t learn their multiplication tables.

1. You need to use the whole body, at least to start with.

I used a exercise ball and had my son skip count first. So if you are doing the 3’s, you count by threes—3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27,

Then I had him chant the tables as he bounced in order. 1 by 3 is 3, 2 by 3 is 6 and so on.

We did this for every one, but only a couple at a time.

I am doing this with my younger son who is not as clearly LD but has had trouble learning with conventional cards. It has made a big difference.

2. I then mixed up the facts. I typed up 30 multiplication facts on a page. We started with 0 through 4, I think. I had one page that had the answers on them so the fact would be

2 X 3 = 6
3 X 3 = 9

The other page had the exact same facts but no answers.

2 X 3 =
3 X 3=

I would time him. He had to recite first the page with the answers on it and then the one without the answers on it. When the two scores were equal (or under 30 seconds—one second per fact), I made a new page. I would keep some earlier facts but add the next facts. So if I had 1-4 on the first page, I would add 5s with the next sheet.

As I said, it took a very long time—almost all year. We did it in fourth grade after he didn’t remember anything he learned from third grade. He is in sixth grade now and knows his multiplication tables.

Learning his multiplication tables made a tremendous difference.

Beth