Beyond Facts & Flashcards: Exploring Math with Your Kids

Most parents know that the most important thing they can do to help their kids learn to read is to read with them. But what's the mathematical equivalent to reading aloud? Up until now, parents have had few models for helping their children understand math. And most existing models are limited to repetitive workbooks and flashcards.

In Beyond Facts & Flashcards, Jan Mokros shows parents how to transform the family's involvement in mathematics to help children see the big picture. The book provides answers to questions such as:

• What mathematical skills should children be developing now to equip them for the future?
• How can parents help children develop these skills?
• How can parents and teachers work together to ensure that children are doing more than a narrowly-defined study of "bookkeeping" math?

Beyond Facts & Flashcards not only presents lots of games and activities that parents and their children can play together, it also describes how the activities relate to mathematics, what's reasonable to expect a child to understand, and how to ask questions that elicit and support children's learning. This is an excellent resource to recommend to parents of primary and elementary students.

Jan Mokros is a developmental psychologist, math educator, and parent of two children in elementary school. She directs the Math Center at TERC in Cambridge, Massachusetts, which designs intriguing new software, curriculums, and teacher development programs. The math in Mokros's everyday life ranges from second-guessing the local real estate market to fantasizing about how fast she'll run that next 10K race.