Literacy Fun from Family Fun!

One of my favorite magazines is Family Fun.  While super cute craft projects and creative food projects typically dominate the pages, I'm drawn toward the underlying theme of literacy this publication incorporates into each issue. Here are two examples from the October issue. Give them a try in your classroom or in your own home ... or both.

Math Evolve: This app, which is available for pretty much any device, lets kids of all ages tune up their math literacy skills through exploration of three creative environments: microscopic, ocean, and outerspace. In each environment, players grow stronger by solving math problems, which allows them to defeat the enemy (super cute aliens and such). The app can be customized to meet the needs of each player. Cost: $1.99!

Street Smarts: This is a great game to play in the car, especially on a long road trip. Players take turns trying to make a sentence out of the letters of the license plate from the car in front of you. the first player to make a complete sentence wins the round. Here's the example from Family Fun:

"LH5-2VF = Let's have vacation fun!"

 

 

Thanks for reading ... it keeps your Mind Full of Literacy!

 

The Numbers Game

True confession time: I don't do math.

I'm a whiz at reading and writing. But arithmetic? I just don't "get it." When letters start flirting with numbers and variables start dancing with equations, I get panicky. I start breathing heavily, my brain jumbles for a few quick seconds, and then it screeches to a halt. It's almost as if the two sides of my brain twisted in opposite directions. Kind of like when you pry open a plastic Easter egg.

Having said that, I view mathematical literacy and financial literacy as two separate skill sets. My financial literacy skills are proficient. I balance my checkbook, create budgets of all shapes and sizes, and understand the basics of investing and borrowing. Some of these tasks involve a higher-order understanding of numbers, but the concepts are concrete. It's the abstract concepts that throw me for a loop and keep my mathematical literacy skills at the basic comprehension level.

But mastery of those abstract mathematical concepts is essential, especially in today's blazing technology world. Yet, it seems as if today's students struggle with mathematical literacy more than ever before. It's important to recognize that different literacy skills and strategies are required to successfully access a math book (or any text book for that matter). As an educator, I truly believe in teaching across the content areas. This means incorporating literacy skills in every class and tailoring that literacy instruction to the content at hand. Unfortunately, in my classroom experiences at the secondary (6 grade and up) level, cross-curricular collaboration is rare. The prevailing school of thought is that literacy encompasses only reading and writing. As such, English/Language Arts teachers bear the main responsibility for teaching it. That doesn't work. Math teachers must teach mathematical literacy, social studies teachers must teach historical literacy, and so on.

I came across two articles focusing on efforts to improve the mathematical literacy skills of young students. One effort uses the latest technology to get - and keep - kids interested in math. The other incorporates written reflection into the high school math classroom as a way to encourage students to think about what they are thinking about (metacognition) as they work math problems. Check out both!

Teach kids math? 17-year-old has an app for that

 

Math and Literacy: Not-So-Strange Bedfellows

Thanks for reading! It keeps your ... Mind Full of Literacy!