How to help DS1 with maths when......

[CardyMow]

His abilities far outstrip my own? . He is in a state primary, and though they do 'differentiate' the work for him, it's not by nearly enough. He has just started Y4, he is 8 and a half. The school are giving him Y5 worksheets, which are too simple for him. I have managed to teach him about squares, and square roots, and long multiplication and division, but he is writing his own algebra sums, doing them, and asking me to mark them.

This might be a good time to point out that I am absolutely POO at maths, it was always a subject I found very difficult, I was always in bottom sets, and failed my GCSE. I cannot do fractions or times tables properly. He is better at maths than I am, and I don't know what to do to help him to stop getting bored with the maths in school, and keep his fire (and ability for it) going.

He is on the G&T register at the school, but that only seems to mean that they give them the work for the year above. He is messing about in class because when he finishes his work in 5 minutes, he is told to just sit quietly. . For a further 45-55 minutes. And is getting into trouble for this.

He had his IQ tested (by the school) last year when he started Y3, and got a 'raw' intelligence score of 132. He was 7.5yo. He is also G&T in English, science and Spanish.

Does anyone have any ideas on how I can hel him when he is better at maths than me? I can't afford tutors etc due to low income.

I'm no expert but in terms of finding work for him at home, I'm sure there's loads of websites that you can use to print worksheets etc. maybe somebody else will recommend some!

My year 5 son is also G&T and has just completed a free month long trial of the Maths Whizz online program.(I have a maths blog so they gave me extended access in order for me to do a review) The good thing about it is that the initial assessment gives your child a maths age for each topic, as well as an overall maths age. My son is 9yrs old and was assessed at having a maths age of 11.2 for place value and 11.9 for addition/subtraction. From there the online tutor explains the work, and online exercises and tests are given. Over the month, I saw my son's maths age increase as he worked through the program. I'll post the link here once my review is published if anyone is interested (it's a screencast video review so I'm still editing it) I'd definitely recommend it!

However, before testing Maths Whizz, we'd already signed him and his sister up for [[http://www.conquermaths.com/members/go.php?r=12327&l=0

Conquer maths]] which is another online maths program. It's also great, if a little more "grown up" since it leads to GCSE maths. The online teaching uses an interactive whiteboard style, whereas Maths Whizz uses lots of cartoon animation.

I was quite happy supplementing with workbooks (we were a Bond family too!)but these online programs are really great as you can be as involved or uninvolved as you want and can focus on other "fun maths" activities or reading Murderous Maths books.

I wish murderous maths books had been around when I was younger

We have also been using Whizz Maths for a month and I would also recommend it for teaching across the whole spectrum of maths.

I am a tutor and I like the CGP books. They have revision books (that explain the work for a particular level) and workbooks/practice books that give lots of lovely questions to do. I'd be tempted to buy him the key stage 2 revision or year 6 books and let him take them into school to do on his own once he has finished the work they set. The school can hardly object if they aren't giving him anything else to do. The information in the revision books is quite dense on each page (as they are designed for revision rather than first time teaching) but may be fine for a dc like your son. There are answers in the backs of the question books or sometimes there is a separate answer book you can buy so you can still mark his work! The books are not very expensive and can be ordered online here:
www.cgpbooks.co.uk/pages/books.asp
They also do maths "workout" books - more questions on a variety of topics at each level and mental maths "workout" books too. I know ideally the school should be providing all of this but as they aren't... It might shame them into doing more?

You might also want to discuss the situation with your local parent partnership team as they may be able to help.
www.parentpartnership.org.uk/

P.S Just re-read your posts and noted that you DS has done some level 7 and 8 books, so maybe the CGP KS3 levels 5-8 stuff might be more appropriate. At least then he might have something interesting to help him "sit quietly" during maths at school!

I second the CGP books - they really appeal to boys due to the humour. They are recommended for revision in our local Grammar School.

There are lots of resources on the internet for children gifted at maths e.g.

nrich.maths.org/public/

mathforum.org/dr/math/ - is very useful if he is having difficulty understanding something. There is a large bank of questions people have already asked - but if your question is not there you can e-mail them and they will send you a personal explanation. They have a team of High School students at the other end.

At the bottom of this page:

mathforum.org/dr.math/abt.drmath.html

there is a list of maths resources which might come in useful.

There is another list of maths sites here: www.physics-gcse.com/math_link.html

despite "physics" in the URL it does list Maths sites aimed at various levels so maybe your DS could find a site he enjoys there.

I've been in your position - given the right resources (and the odd e-mail from Dr. Math!) your DS will be fine and continue to enjoy his maths.

TBH I don't really like CGP (I used them at school) - I found them really patronising and busy, and if your DS is very advanced he may not like that. you could get a load out of the library and see what style he likes.