Friday, January 22, 2010

The Facts of Life

You take the good, you take the bad,
you take them both and there you have
The Facts of Life, the Facts of Life.


There's a time you got to go and show
You're growin' now you know about
The Facts of Life, the Facts of Life.


When the world never seems
to be livin up to your dreams
And suddenly you're finding out
the Facts of Life are all about you, you.


It takes a lot to get 'em right
When you're learning the Facts of Life. (learning the Facts of Life)
Learning the Facts of Life (learning the Facts of Life)
Learning the Facts of Life.

Lyrics and credits found here. 
Thank you miss s for giving me the knowledge that sites like that exist.

Anyone out there besides me re-living the learning of the facts?

Math facts, that is.
We've got to know our facts, just makes life that much better.

12 X 12 = ?

We've been using a wonderful tool.  It's free.  Free is usually good.  This one's good.
Here's the link: Free Math Worksheets. They cover so many math procedures for young and old.

This is our routine for memorizing the facts:

I write out the facts on a 3x5 card.
I ask the child the facts (pretest) to see what they already know.
The child (who is able to read) then gets the card to use to do some self talk. This means tell him/herself the facts over and over. 
I also ask them to take a picture of each fact and stick it in their brain.
I ask the facts again-if they know them all, move on to the quiz sheet-if not, note the facts not known, write them at the top of a paper and have the child copy at least 10 times while saying the fact out loud. Ask him/her to take more pictures for their brain.

Now, go print out a fact sheet-there are even answer sheets on there-if help is needed.
Sometimes we just do the sheet.
Sometimes we do it "timed."
I just love saying, "ready begin."
And starting the timer.
Such power.

So this system has worked for us these past few weeks with one of my people.
It 's worked better for some kids than others.
I haven't always done it this way. 
All people learn differently, figure out what works for yours.
I think I am done with the disclaimers now.

12 X 12 = 144

Now quick, what's 12 X 9=?

(And, if you recognized the lyrics at the beginning of this post, how funny is that?  Were you a fan or Jo or Blair? --or George Clooney?)

108.




1 comment:

  1. There's also a website called "Cool Math Games", and a free game you can download to your computer called "Timez Attack". Ben STILL doesn't know his times tables by heart...

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