Monday, December 2, 2013

When First Grade Math Confused Me

"This is making no sense!" I shrieked, staring at the paper. I looked at Natalie who was rolling around on the floor. "How do you do this?" I asked her. After all, this was HER homework.

Natalie paused in her rolling and peered at the paper. "I have no idea," she said seriously.

"But surely they must've taught you this in school?" I pressed.

Natalie shrugged. "I have no idea!"

Well, some help SHE was.

Seriously though, the homework was weird.




"This is FIRST GRADE homework!" I shouted to no one. "I should UNDERSTAND this!"

But I didn't.

And my daughter was now spinning around the room. Getting her to do homework is never easy. She'd much rather dance. Or sing. Or play My Little Ponies. Or...anything, really.

Tom came home and I thrust the paper in his face. "We don't know what's going on!" I shrieked.

Tom blinked. "Jesus, neither do I! What the hell?" He took the paper.

"Explain how to do that, please." I am awful in math. Awful. I forget even the basic stuff. Tom is a little better with math, but not much.

"Well, sure, this is easy," Tom began and I immediately felt foolish. Maybe I missed something? But then Tom frowned and went, "Wait, never mind." Then he hopped on his laptop and tried to figure it all out.

He couldn't.

Soon after that, our neighbor came to the door and SHE explained it to us. This was because her daughter had stopped by asking if Natalie could play and I said she had to finish her homework first. Then the daughter probably ran back and was all, "They're confused too!" so the mom came over to make sure we weren't balled up on the floor, crying.

Anyway, I understood soon after, praise chocolate. And it was TOUGH STUFF for a first grader. This was the final paper, in case your confounded mind had no idea how to do it either. And if you figured it out right away, please come live with us and teach us your ways.


Frames and Arrows can kiss my my pale butt.


19 comments:

  1. My kids don't even ask me for homework help anymore. I am a complete loser when it comes to math. I'm pretty sure my 8th grader is doing harder stuff than I did in college. Of course I was an Early Childhood Ed major and focused on Preschool. But that's besides the point.

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  2. Ah, yes, I have definitely seen those kinds of sheets in our home, too! I TOTALLY get it! NOT. Seriously, why do they make it all so complicated??!!-Ashley

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  3. I have looked at similar sheets before and have been confused. Thankfully I only work at an after school program I don't have kids and in our handbook it says we check for completeness but parents should check for accuracy.

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  4. I think it's just that they have changed the way they teach math - we learned the basics and now they have fancied it up (not sure why!!).

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  5. I should have been there, I love that stuff! I just text my 5th graders teacher when it doesn't make sense. Except that I taught math, so I should be embarrassed to admit that.
    ~ Sara

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  6. we have those too, but they only have one rule per line. it looks confusing with the solid / dotted arrows! the school sends us parent letters to teach us how to do stuff though!

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  7. I absolutely HATE the way that my kids have to do math now. I actually love math- it was my favorite thing to teach. But the bizarre ways they have to be taught now totally confuse me.

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  8. Have to admit I did the same thing as Tom - oh that's easy! uh no,no wait a minute.
    Got it eventually though! Seems like they are over-complicating things just a LOT

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  9. I'm lost. I have a plan in action for when Scarlet has to do math homework. I plan to cry and call my dad.

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  10. This made me laugh. I rarely understand my kids homework. Luckily I now have older kids that understand the younger kids' homework.

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  11. I looked at it and understood it instantly....I am a teacher though. :)

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  12. I finally did get it... But I fully admit it took me a long while. I kept trying to apply the rule to the line it was next to and not based on the arrow that connected the stupid marshmallows. That's a mean worksheet to give parents!

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  13. It took me a minute but I got it, I just had to remember to watch the arrows carefully. That is crazy homework for a first grader!

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  14. I remember having the same math question in my homework as my brother when he was in middleschool, and I elementary. Haha!

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  16. hahahahaha! Oh my gosh. My daughter is in 2nd grade, and I don't have a clue either. This made me laugh so hard. :)

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  17. I used to teach second grade. When my daughter was in second grade her math homework confused me. I currently work in an office in the College of Education and I had to have one of my students explain Frances' math homework to me. The "new math" can kiss my rear!!

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  18. Huh? Is there a way that you can explain this to me because I don't get it!

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  19. the solid and dotted arrows represent which of the two things on the left that you're supposed to do. So when the third number is 8 and there's a dasshed line to get to that box, you have to subtract 3 from that box to get 8. So 11 goes in the second box. You keep working backwards or forwards from there to fill out the whole two lines.

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