
Ask HN: What book did you use to teach your children math? - sanoli
This question is obviously for the ones who either homeschooled their kids, or who did some teaching at home besides the school curriculum. I&#x27;d like to get some suggestions, opinions, etc. Thanks in advance!
======
lorenzorhoades
Khan academy is a great resource for your child to learn math. It was actually
started with the realization that kids like to learn at there own pace, not
being waited on by a tutor or teacher for them to understand the subject.

~~~
sanoli
At what age is it appropriate to begin Khan Academy's math content?

~~~
darkmagnus
I think any age you are comfortable with. My son's school just started using
Khan Academy as a supplement. He is in second grade, but third grade math. He
really enjoys it, as do I.

------
tkosan
In 1993 my wife and I had a son, and we decided to homeschool him. I took
responsibility for my son’s mathematics education. I started by collecting
hundreds of used math books (and some new ones), and then I identified the
best of them to use as textbooks. I discovered that most of the books were of
very low quality, and that only a few of them seemed to be any good. I did not
realize until my son was in college that the reason the “good” books were good
was because they were based on formal mathematics.

My son did not have any noticeable talent for mathematics when he first
started learning it. In fact, he was not very good at math at all. I couldn’t
directly teach him math because I did not understand it very well at that
time, so I had him work through some of the math books I set aside. Before he
went to college, he worked through one “Saxon Math” arithmetic book, one book
titled “How to Think Like a Mathematician” by Kevin Houston (which dealt with
how to do proofs), and a book titled “Fundamental Mathematics” fourth edition
by Wade and Taylor (which was based on 1960s New Math). Around a third of the
way through the fundamental mathematics book he apparently saw how formal
mathematics worked because he started being able to do mathematics quickly,
accurately, and with confidence. He did not like math very much up to this
point, but as soon as he was able to do math, he began to like it more and
more.

Before college, my son never took even one math test. When he entered college,
he majored in mathematics and physics. He was easily able to do all of the
work in the mathematics and physics courses he took. This past spring he
graduated with a GPA of 3.9.

Since 2008 I have been developing open source mathematics software that
students can use to learn how mathematics works at a deep level. Here are some
examples of what I have created so far:

[http://patternmatics.org/test/expression_structure.html](http://patternmatics.org/test/expression_structure.html)
[http://patternmatics.org/](http://patternmatics.org/)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYtsQ_PczlY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kYtsQ_PczlY)
[http://www.mathpiper.org/](http://www.mathpiper.org/)

The last link is to an education-oriented computer algebra system. If you (or
anyone else) is interested in learning more about this software and my
thoughts on mathematics education, feel free to ask questions about it on the
MathPiper developer list.

------
DanBC
_Maths for Mums and Dads_ :

[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Maths-Mums-Dads-Mike-
Askew/dp/022408...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Maths-Mums-Dads-Mike-
Askew/dp/0224086359/)

[http://www.amazon.com/Maths-Mums-Dads-Mike-
Askew/dp/02240863...](http://www.amazon.com/Maths-Mums-Dads-Mike-
Askew/dp/0224086359/)

 _The Number Devil_ is often recommended:

[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Number-Devil-Mathematical-
Adventure/...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Number-Devil-Mathematical-
Adventure/dp/0805062998/)

[http://www.amazon.com/Number-Devil-Mathematical-
Adventure/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Number-Devil-Mathematical-
Adventure/dp/0805062998/)

How young are the children? What you can do for very young children is get
some small stones and paint numbers and letters on them (use child friendly
paint, obviously) and then use a toy dump truck and toy loader to move them
around, and start recognising the numbers and letters, and start very simple
spelling and arithmetic. Or you can paint numbers onto toy cars and use paint
numbers onto a car park.

Cuisenaire rods are fun and useful.

[http://www.amazon.co.uk/Legler-Multiplication-Sticks-
Educati...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/Legler-Multiplication-Sticks-Educational-
Toy/dp/B00074U7SO)

Sometimes they come with books and you probably want to ignore most of the
book. (Because knowing that green + red = blue is not useful.)

You can bulk buy dice. Chessex sometimes sell "pound of dice", and these are
lovely tactile clicky clacky things. You can use these for games or rewards.

------
tmaly
I started with this one [http://www.amazon.com/Teach-Your-Gentle-Revolution-
Series/dp...](http://www.amazon.com/Teach-Your-Gentle-Revolution-
Series/dp/075700184X) I liked the dots concept. My daughter is only 2 but she
can count to 40 in English and 20 in French. She can do basic addition using
the counting method.

------
thejteam
We used Singapore Math and really liked it. I think of it as having all the
good parts of Common Core (an emphasis on abstract thought) but without all of
the crazy parts.

~~~
sanoli
How old was your child when you started it?

------
AnimalMuppet
We like the "Life of Fred" series.

[http://lifeoffredmath.com/](http://lifeoffredmath.com/)

~~~
sanoli
Didn't know about this one. Seems like the storytelling aspect is pretty good.
How long have you used it for?

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Um... several years, but I'm not sure how many. Or, all the way from fractions
up to trig. It's quirky, but the content is solid.

------
heisenstalt
it doesn't matter. at the basic level, solved domain -- all that matters is
that they do problems

