Tag Archives: fun math

7th Annual Main Line Math Festival

Posted on October 8, 2023 by aofradkin

Our 7th annual Math Festival on the Philadelphia Main Line for children ages 5-12 is happening on October 22, 2023! It will take place at Main Line Classical Academy and is jointly sponsored by MLCA and Golden Key Enrichment. If … Continue reading →

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Our Second Fun Math Festival

Posted on December 15, 2016 by aofradkin

We had another wonderful math festival, hosted jointly by Golden Key Russian School and Main Line Classical Academy.  Here is an account of it, written by Yulia Shpilman. We did it, we did it, we did it again! Last Sunday, … Continue reading →

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Math should be felt with your hands: Interview with Jane Kats

Posted on October 29, 2016 by aofradkin

If you ask me whose philosophies on elementary school teaching have influenced me the most, I will answer without pause: Jane Kats.  Jane is a math educator, the author of numerous books and workbooks for educators, parents and children, and a general … Continue reading →

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Drawing stars and triangles

Posted on September 25, 2016 by aofradkin

Last week we did several really fun activities from the book A Collection of Math Lessons, A: Grades 1-3  by Marilyn Burns and Bonnie Tank.  Here is an account of one of them. The activity was “How many stars can … Continue reading →

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What is a number? – First week of Kindergarten Math

Posted on September 9, 2016 by aofradkin

My first week of teaching has been a lot of fun!  This post is about some of the things we did with the Kindergartners. On the first day, after introductions and getting to know each other, I asked them what … Continue reading →

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Keeping Kids’ Curiosities Alive: Conversation with James Tanton

Posted on September 6, 2016 by aofradkin

What associations do words like “meaningful, joyful, relevant, human, with thinking” invoke in your mind? Of all the possibilities, I bet one of the least likely associations is “mathematics”.  And yet, if you ask James Tanton, the Mathematician-at-Large for the … Continue reading →

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What makes a triangle?

Posted on July 10, 2016 by aofradkin

Last weekend we went to a wonderful family camp with an Ancient Greece theme. I was tasked with coming up with a fun, hands-on geometry lesson for 5-7 year olds. These were my criteria for the activity: 1) Easy prep … Continue reading →

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Diagonal is not straight

Posted on May 25, 2016 by aofradkin

Zoe and I often play games where one of us makes a figure with some objects (stones, chips, snap-cubes, etc.) and the other one has to make an identical figure.  Today, for this purpose, we were using an old Russian … Continue reading →

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Nonstandard Division

Posted on May 12, 2016 by aofradkin

The game Labyrinth has been a recent favorite at our house.  However, this post isn’t so much about the game itself, but rather about Zoe dealing with a certain aspect of the setup: dividing a pile of cards evenly between … Continue reading →

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Factor “trees”

Posted on March 1, 2016 by aofradkin

Recently, we had a few lessons on prime numbers and factoring with my 4th and 5th graders.  Inspired by the beautiful drawings in this post, I had my students draw their own factor trees.  Actually, most of their creations can only … Continue reading →

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