St Francis Xavier’s Primary School, Narrabri

Leader of Pedagogy

Maths at Home

 

What are the students learning in Maths at the moment? Can you assist their learning through conversations and activities at home? 

 

Kindergarten - Combining & Separating Quantities: Addition

  • With your child, identify situations in daily life where addition may be used. 
  • Combine two groups of objects to model addition, using words such as 'count forwards', 'combines with', 'joins', 'altogether', 'makes'.
  • Use concrete materials or fingers to solve addition questions, counting forwards by ones.
  • Compare two groups of objects to determine how many more.
  • Create, model and recognise combinations for numbers up to 10 (eg 6 & 4).

Year 1 & 2 - Two-Dimensional Spatial Structure: Area

  • Compare the area of two surfaces (eg coffee table & dining table), predicting which one is larger, and checking by covering with the same informal unit (eg. sheet of paper).
  • With your child, identify situations in daily life where they may need to measure area.
  • When having conversations about area, use language such as 'surface', 'cover', 'measure', 'estimate'.

Year 3 & 4 - Three-Dimensional Spatial Structure: 3D Objects

  • Identify prisms (eg cubes), pyramids and cylinders in your home environment
  • Make prisms, pyramids and cylinders using materials at home such as paper, blocks, Lego, toothpicks and Blu-Tack.
  • When having conversations about 3D objects, use vocabulary such as 'three-dimensional', 'surface', 'edge', face'.

Year 5 & 6 - Two-Dimensional Spatial Structure: Area

  • With your child, identify situations where square kilometres and hectares are used for measuring area.
  • When having conversations about area with your child, use language such as 'dimensions', 'hectare', 'length', 'width', 'measure', 'square kilometre', 'square metre'.
  • Measure the size of your backyard/sandpit/house. 

Having conversations at home about what your child is learning at school and incorporating this into your daily activities is a great way to consolidate their understanding. It also helps students to become more engaged in their learning when their parents are engaged also. 

 

Holly Greenaway