I'd take a look at the videos on Khan academy. It makes everything more understandable. Have you ride looking through the curriculum for internet links? If the math is new, most publishers are including helpful videos explaining how to solve problems.

I'll definitely take a look. Thanks Jenn. I need all the help I can get. Sydney is really struggling with math. She comes home and needs help, so I teach her my way. She gets it right away, long division the old way (the way we were taught), multiplication (the way we were taught), she gets it right away. But the new math, it confounds her, and me and Rod and all of us. So she takes a test, does the math the way I taught her, gets the right answer, and fails because she didn't use the new math. I don't think that's right. Who cares how you got the answer, as long as you got it?

Just frustrates me beyond reason.

It is frustrating Alty. On one hand, we want kids to understand that there can be more than one way to reach an answer. In fact, we would have class discussions about the different ways students came to their conclusion.

The newer way is thought to give students a better understanding of not only how to get the answer but why the various rules work... to increase reasoning. For example, knowing why we move a decimal in Division; what is actually happening, instead of just knowing and following the rule.

Kids do often understand once they get it, but it can take time, and it's even sometimes a challenge for teachers to teach a new way.

I can see pros and cons in both ways of thinking, but I do think too much emphasis is placed on problem solving in a specific way. There is plenty of room to present more than one way of thinking for students to build on.

Hope the videos help it to make more sense. We had a couple of parent math nights just to help parents better understand the changes.

It is difficult, but I think the bigger picture is that problem-solving has changed. We teach students to figure out why something is done, so they can solve math problems. We memorized in our day, but that doesn't teach much. My youngest knew all of his multiplication tables in Kindergarten but had no clue what they meant. We're teaching with counters in Kindergarten, and my kiddos know all the vocabulary that goes along with it. It's new to some, but teaching keeps going in cycles. We've done this before, moved away from it, and now it's back. It takes a lot of training, but that's because we have all the technology components. It scares so many teachers that many are retiring. Not me, I'm going to continue on until this Common Core stuff is a distant memory.

Common core won't be taught here next year! Yay!

Kahn Academy is great. Although, I've enrolled Little J in summer school. It's online and it's free. I think they have one in Canada, but I'm not sure. Check out Credit Recovery tutoring Canada. For us it's through a program called K12. The school will accept these grades and boost his GPA.

I'll definitely check it ou J. Syd needs all the help she can get with math. Next year she's in 9th grade, and then we go to 10th where math becomes even more complicated. If she doesn't have down the basics by the end of 9th, she'll be screwed, like I was, in 10th, 11th, and 12th. I don't want that for her.

She's a bright kid, but she's so much like me. If she doesn't understand something right away, she tends to give up. :(

Alty, any news? I've been thinking about you and hope everything turned out well.

No news yet. I was told that no news is good news, they normally only call if they find something. So I'm guessing that I'm okay.

Seeing my doctor next week for prescription refill so I'll ask him then. :)

Excellent!! Glad to hear it!