Innovative Ways to Keep Kids Learning Math Over the Summer (EP 39)

Innovative Ways to Keep Kids Learning Math Over the Summer With Melanie Doppler

Annamarie: 

Hey teachers! You are in for such a treat today because I have Melanie Doppler from Math Coach Connection on the show today. The reason I wanted to have Melanie on today was because you’re going to have those parents reach out wondering how they can help their child practice math over the summer. You may even have to do this. This may be a requirement that you put together a summer packet of some sort.

So, we are here to help you come up with these ideas, so you don’t have to add it to your end-of-the-year checklist. Plus, I know a lot of you are parents as well, and you might want ideas for your own kids.

I want to tell you a little bit about Melanie before we get started.

Melanie has over 10 years of experience as an elementary math teacher as well as a math coach, consultant, and content creator. She believes that math should be engaging, should make sense, and should be accessible to all. She created Math Coach Connection in 2019 as a way to create a space where both families and teachers could come to find ideas, resources, tips, and more as they support their students in building an understanding of elementary math concepts.

Her goal is to connect children and their supporters to elementary math through her math resources, courses, podcast, book collection, blog, and more. In addition to math coaching, Melanie is a wife, a mother of two, a dance teacher, and a runner.

She recently moved from Nashville, Tennessee where she first connected with me, back to her hometown in Wisconsin to buy and renovate her childhood home, and she is so excited to continue Math Coach Connection back in her hometown.

So, that’s a little bit about Melanie. You guys are gonna love this episode. So, let’s jump right in.

Annamarie: 

Hey there and welcome to another episode of Elementary Math Chat. I am super excited about today’s episode because I have my friend, Melanie Doppler here from Math Coach Connection, and if you follow her on Instagram, you know she is the go-to person for helping families connect math to everyday activities.

Welcome to the podcast, Melanie! Thank you so much for being here!

Melanie:

Thank you so much for having me. I’m so excited to be here. I love your podcast. I think it’s such an awesome resource for elementary teachers, and I’m just so excited to help share that family at-home connection and kind of give teachers some ideas and parents some ideas about how they can, you know, engage their kids in math over the summer.

Annamarie: 

That is the goal for today for sure. Well, we both know how busy the end of the school year is, and there are always those last-minute requests from parents wondering how they can help their child practice math over the summer. And listen, we love those requests. But sometimes when they come like two to three days before the end of the year, you’re like, ahhh! One more thing to do!

So, what would you recommend for a few fun and easy ways that parents can help their kids experience math at home?

Melanie: 

Yeah, so one of the big things I love doing is creating things or thinking of ideas that I would want and that I need as a teacher. And so I’ve been thinking a lot about this summer math idea because teachers always need something to hand out at the end of the year where you sort of you feel like not only did you just check the box of like, here’s some summer practice, but also here’s some actual meaningful things you can work on that then will prepare you and set you up for success for next year.

But I also know that from the parent perspective, we do not have a lot of time on our hands, especially in the summer, when kids aren’t coming home with homework every day. It can slip your mind like oh, we didn’t work on math all summer. And now here we are, it’s back to school.

So, I think it’s really important to integrate math practice into your daily routine into things that you’re already doing. And there’s a couple of different ways or categories that I like to think about or encourage teachers to share with parents.

The first one is math at mealtime. I think anytime you’re cooking, baking, planning a meal, grocery shopping can be included in that, or even just eating the meal. There are so many real-world math examples, all the way from kindergarten, whether it’s counting how many blueberries are on your plate, you know, practicing that one-to-one correspondence.

Or taking those same blueberries and at the third-grade level, doing an equal groups multiplication model. You know, you have five people at the table, and everyone has six blueberries on their plate. How many total blueberries are there?

And you can take that, you know, and you can do fractions with eating. You can take your pizza and cut it into equal shares. Or same thing with a cake; cutting it in a linear rectangular model that can connect to a number line. I mean, I could go on and on, fractions and a recipe. There’s just so many different examples.

So, anytime you’re eating, seriously, just look at the food you’re eating and think like, is there a shape? Is there a way we could count it? Is there a way we could connect it to math? And I think that’s one that’s super easy because you already are going to be doing mealtime. So, you may as well just integrate some math into it.

 Another one is, it sounds simple, and it is, but conversation starters. Having meaningful conversations with your kids about math. Just actually bringing math into the discussion. I think in the summer, a lot of times we’re driving places, whether it’s a road trip, whether it’s driving to swim lessons, or to the baseball game.

Whatever it might be, instead of just turning up the music or not talking or letting them play on a device or something like that, it’s actually a really great opportunity to bring real-world math into the conversation. Like, hey, I noticed that street sign. What number did you see? What number was in the tens place? Or is that number bigger than or smaller than the number 10? You know, whatever that might be.

So, kind of just looking for real-world math as you’re driving, or just as you’re sitting, hanging out, sitting outside, listening to the birds; it could be anything. You can just find different ways to talk to your child about math and see those real-world examples.

And then the last one, I mean, there are tons but another category I think that is helpful is if you integrate a family game night or a family read-aloud of some sort into your weekly routine. Whether it’s a Friday game night or once every couple of weeks, you plan a very specific game to play as a family.

There are so many fun games out there, and really any game that uses dice you can connect to math. Card games we can connect to math. There are lots of different ways to integrate that even without saying this is math. Kids are using their math skills to solve it. Whether it’s Monopoly Jr, right, you have to count all the money that you have and spend the money. There are all different types of math connections there.

So, looking for specific games, and then also books to read together that include math, and later I’ll share a little bit about how I’ve already done a lot of the hard work for that for all you elementary teachers. I’ve done a lot of research on some good books and games.

Annamarie: 

I also think it’s important to recognize that it doesn’t have to dominate your whole dinner conversation. It’s just the simple ways that you mentioned, and what you’re so good at is you teach parents how to do this from the beginning. From kindergarten to first grade, and they can develop these habits and carry them all the way through elementary school.

Melanie: 

Thank you. Yeah, I think it’s so important to see that all these skills are not just in isolation. That something your third grader learns in third grade, they actually started learning the foundation of it in kindergarten at first, and then they’ll continue building on in fourth and fifth. And so yeah, bringing it into the routine is super important.

Annamarie: 

It’s also a good way for parents to understand where their kids struggle and what areas they do well with, like reading large numbers. I think a lot of parents don’t realize how many fourth graders or fifth graders can’t read a seven-digit number or a 10-digit number.

So, like you said, even just pronouncing those numbers, like when you see neighborhoods that have the sign that says from the $700,000s. They could practice reading that number. I mean, that’s pretty simple. But then they could practice reading numbers that are close to 700,000. That ties in estimation as well.

Melanie: 

Yeah, absolutely.

Annamarie: 

Well, since summer is a common time for traveling and taking vacations, what are some ways that parents can incorporate math into either the planning stages or maybe during their vacation? 

Melanie: 

I love this topic. I’m really big on finding great examples of math in the real world and then just building on them. I’ve even made a beach road trip math project because I was like, road trip, this is perfect. There are so many examples of math in the real world.

But I think from the planning stages, including your child in the conversation of planning certain parts can be really helpful in bringing math into the conversation. So, planning a budget, which we all should do anyway, and probably half of us don’t, maybe more than half of us. So, having your child help you think about, like, what is our budget for maybe your little souvenir budget.

Or, depending on the grade level, it could be the budget for the whole trip? And then they get to help you think about, okay, estimating about how much do you think we’ll spend in each of these different categories. And then it’s fun, because throughout the trip, they can actually help you keep track of the budget, and they can keep you on track and be like, hey Mom, you spend too much on whatever X, Y, or Z.

Or if they want a souvenir and you’re already over budget, it actually can help with that too. So, integrating them into the conversation, and you can do whole number addition and subtraction for the budget if you’re in a K-2 range. Or you can use decimals as you get into fourth and fifth and actually use specific amounts of money. So, I think in that planning phase, using them to help plan a budget is great.

You also can calculate mileage. I love using mileage because it’s a linear model and we can relate it really nicely to a number line. So, if you are doing a road trip or flying somewhere, you can look at the total number of miles, maybe how many times you’ll stop, and you can convert miles into feet and yards. Or if you’re working in the metric system, you can do that too.

And it’s great for elapsed time problems too for third grade, and then kind of building on that. Like, if it takes us two hours, what time will we get there, or whatever that might be?

I also think that road trips or trips on a plane or wherever you’re going are great for estimation. So, when you get somewhere, you’re looking at a tall building. Or you go to the zoo, and you’re looking at a giraffe. About how tall do you think that is? Or about how much more time do you think we spent here than we spent there? Or, you know, just kind of those little approximations that we really need as a real-world math skill.

You see them all the time when you’re traveling. It’s basically like taking a regular day and compacting it and giving you so many examples of math and estimation and things like that.

Annamarie: 

I am laughing so hard right now because I am terrible at estimation. My husband knows never to ask me like, how many people do you think are here? I am always way off.

He did that one time we were at a concert. I think, actually, it was the TPT conference in Austin and we were at a concert. And we’re sitting there and he’s like, how many people do you think are here? I think I said like 500, and I think it was more like 3,000.

I don’t know how you develop those skills unless you just practice and then learn, you know, how far you’re off and adjust your answers that way.

Melanie: 

Yeah, definitely. I was just at a wedding shower the other day, and we had to, you know, guess the number of Hershey’s Kisses in a jar. And I was stopping like, okay. Wait, use your estimation skills. You know, let’s think about this problem, right? And, and it’s so true. I mean, if you’re at a baseball game, or a fair or festival, saying about how many people do you think are here? Or about how much money do you think this concert, how much do you think they made? Things like that.

Unless you think about it, if you don’t think about it, and then you don’t use the skill, it’s easy for that skill to fall to the wayside. But it’s so important.

Annamarie: 

Well, I need to keep practicing my estimation. So, I need to take your advice.

Melanie: 

That’s good.

Annamarie: 

Well, let’s go ahead and talk about everyday life. Because we know you don’t have to be on vacation. You don’t have to be at home to experience math, and I know you’re always showing this on your Instagram. What are your favorite ways to incorporate math when you are out and about running errands, or you’re at a restaurant, or just experiencing everyday life outside of your house?

Melanie: 

Yeah, so I think it’s probably easier for me than most people because I do have such a K-5 math brain. And so, I am constantly like, everywhere I go, I’m like, math in the real world to the point where my family will make fun of me and they’ll be like, oh, mama, it’s math in the real world. Or my husband will crack a joke like, oh, you know, there’s another. She’s gonna point this out. But it is so true that literally everywhere you go there’s an example of math.

Like if you go to a park or a playground, you can be measuring or thinking about or estimating the height of different slides. Angle measurement on the playground. You could solve problems about how many people were there when you got there versus how many people are there now, and what’s the difference.

I just love finding math in real-world situations because that’s how you get the buy-in from students. When they really feel like it’s an important part of their life and they see it as having value, rather than just being like, oh, math is this thing that I do in the classroom, and it doesn’t impact my life. I think it’s so important that they see like, oh, I just used my math skills.

For example, right now we’re building a playhouse in our backyard, and my four-year-old son is doing a lot of the measuring because he loves using a measuring tape. And so even at that age, we’re starting talking about, okay, we look at the zero first. And then here’s how we measure and here’s where we would look at the numbers. And even just little skills like that.

It’s important in the real world because if we didn’t measure the playhouse, then all the wood pieces would be the wrong size and it wouldn’t look good. And he’s even getting that idea at the age of four. So, it’s everywhere. Math is everywhere.

Annamarie: 

I think the more you do it, the more ideas you’ll get and the more natural it becomes. It can even be as easy as you’re going to a playground, but before you get to play you have to show me five examples of parallel lines or four right angles, and then you get to go play.

Melanie: 

Yeah. And I think exactly to your point of what you just said, being intentional about it is really important. I think that’s one of the messages I’d love to share with teachers and parents and families over the summer. All of these examples of math will pass you by, and you’ll miss this opportunity if you’re not intentional about it.

Even if it’s like, you know, we have to buy extra milk every week. I always think we buy enough, and then we always need to go get another gallon of milk. And, you know, my kids aren’t quite old enough for this conversation yet.

But with some older students, you might be able to say, hey, here’s how much milk is in a gallon. This is what that equals in cups or fluid ounces. Let’s divide that by the days of the week and figure out exactly how much milk we need so that we stop having this problem of needing to buy more every week. You know, things like that.

As the parent, I’m just gonna do it. I’m just gonna go buy the milk. But if I know that my students or my kids are at that age where it would be really beneficial to have that conversation, then that’s a great example. So, just being really intentional about those examples. And I think all of this, what we just talked about, was the inspiration for this guide that I created for this summer. And I don’t know if you want me to talk about that now or later.

Annamarie: 

No, go ahead. I think this fits perfectly into what we’re talking about.

Melanie: 

So, I was trying to think about how could I help parents and families over the summer support their kids with math, but not just hand them a worksheet, or not have to go totally out of their way to plan things and get materials. And so, I came up with the idea for a summer math guide for every grade level K-5, and these are available on my website, mathcoachconnection.com, but we can talk about that part later.

But in the guide, I break it down by skill. So, let’s say third grade, for example, we have a whole number addition, subtraction, multiplication, division. We also have some basic fraction concepts, measurement and data, and geometry. And for each of those categories, I just have a really simple page that includes ideas to integrate that into math at mealtime.

I give you some conversation starters. It’s exactly what I was talking about before, but I did all the legwork so that parents don’t have to come up with it themselves.

There are conversation starters to talk to your child about. There’s a list of super simple activities you can do. Some of them are, you know, a dice game or a card game, but they require very minimal materials. And then there’s also helpful tips for parents and families, things to know about that skill.

One of my favorite parts is I put together a list of my favorite, really high-quality books and games that families can play for those game nights, or that you can do as read-alouds. And there’s a list for each of those skills. So, there are addition books and games and multiplication books and games. And so, I give sort of a layout of how you could use it over the summer.

You could just focus on one skill per week, and really all that means is you’re not going to spend your whole day or your whole mealtime talking about math that whole week. But during your addition week, you’re going to try to bring in some of these conversation starters when you’re in the car or you’re at dinner. The math at mealtime things might inspire you to try a fun snack that incorporates some of these counting activities.

And then maybe for Game Night if you choose to do that, there are some ideas that you can try. So, it’s really more suggestions, ways to make life easier for parents to do what they’re already doing, but also help their kids with math at the same time. So, I’m super excited about them. I think it’s really something that families need. And so, I’m hoping that it’s really helpful for a lot of families this summer.

Again, I have a separate one for kindergarten, first, second, third, fourth, and fifth grade to help set them up for success in the following school year.

Annamarie: 

Those sound amazing. Oh my goodness, you have done so much work. And I think parents or even teachers might feel a little overwhelmed about all the things we’re talking about, but you’re right. You have done all of the work for them.

Melanie: 

Yes, it was a lot of work. But I think as a parent, I know that time is a barrier to being able to help your kids with math or with homework and stuff, and often we don’t have time for it. So, I’m like, okay, if I just give you the activities, and it takes no extra prep work, it just makes it a lot easier.

Annamarie: 

And I’m sure most of them you’ve already done with your own kids too, so you know that they work. All right. Well, I want to talk about your math projects for a minute because you have such a good variety of projects that tie in real-world connections. They are so creative. They are so clever. Every time I see a new one posted to TPT I’m like, oh my goodness, she thought of that!  

I don’t know how you think of all of this, but I think not only would they be great for parents to do with their kids over the summer, but also for teachers to do with their classes that last week or two of school. So, tell us about some of your favorite summer-themed math projects.

Melanie: 

Yeah, well, first of all, thank you. You’re so sweet. Doing the math projects, making those is my very favorite thing. I have so much fun. Those are the things that I needed as a teacher. I was like, last week of school, last couple of weeks of school, I was like give me a good project that can engage my students and really give them solid math practice, but also they’re really excited about. So, I’ve come up with a bunch of different ones.

One of my favorite summer ones is my Baseball Math Project that I have for fourth and fifth grade. This is a perfect one to do at home. I’ve had a lot of parents reach out to me and say they’ve done it at home with their kids, and then paired it with like, and then we went to a baseball game, and we connected it to that because there are a lot of really great connections to math and baseball.

So, like calculating batting averages and angles of the baseball field. I mean, I won’t give too much away, but there’s a ton of fun in there for fourth and fifth grade with problem-solving. So that’s one of my favorites for summertime.

I also have a series of math mysteries from second grade all the way through fifth grade, and these are not necessarily summer-specific. Some of them lean a little more towards, like, there’s a parade mystery, but some of them are more general like a mystery about who took the cookies, and one about a mystery in a park and different things like that.

But they’re super super engaging for children, which is why I think they’re great for at-home summer projects because kids want to solve the mystery. Everybody loves a good mystery, you know, and trying to figure it out. But in order to solve the mystery, they have to solve real-world contextual math problems and then use those answers to help them figure out the bigger problem. 

So, it’s also a great way to check their work, which is why I like that for at home because parents don’t have to do any extra checking for them. The children can see, oh, well, if I got that, it must not have been right because it didn’t fit into this next piece. So, I love the math mystery series. It’s really fun. I have to stop myself from creating more all the time because I just love them.

Annamarie: 

Oh my goodness, why? No, I don’t think you should stop! And I love how you say you can solve it and then let’s go make cookies if it was about cookies. Or let’s go to the park if it was about a park. That’s so fun to tie all that in.

Melanie: 

Yeah, I think it really makes it fun when you can do it actually in your classroom. Another one I have is my party planning projects. So, I have Plan a Circus Party, Plan a Picnic Party, those are really good ones for third grade. I also have a couple others. Plan a Birthday Party is another one. That’s a fifth-grade project.

But my party planning series is super fun because I’ve heard a lot of teachers say, and then we planned a circus-themed party in our class. Or at home, parents might say, well, their birthday party is coming up. So, let’s do this birthday party planning project and kind of integrate that right in.

And I do like the projects because they are a little more self-directed. Sometimes the children might need a little support reading because it is so contextual. Some of the little stories that go along with it a parent could help them with. And that’s a great place for a parent to help because they’re not doing a problem for them but supporting them with the reading aspect of it. That’s great. They can, you know, help them with that. It kind of helps it become more of a family thing.

But party projects. I have career math projects. I have all kinds of different fun projects for water, some waterpark projects which are fun in the summer. But also too, if your parents are just looking for just some really engaging story-problem practice or skill practice, I do also have summer math story problems and also summer math 4-week practice guides for the summer.

Those are really great for students to just be able to do by themselves, get that really solid practice, and not have to, they really shouldn’t need any support and doing those. They’ll be able to sit down and do them more independently.

One other thing I just wanted to mention about the projects that’s super important to me is that they’re differentiated, but they’re sneaky differentiated. What I mean by that is there are different levels, and the only thing that tells you what level it is is a small little, you know, symbol or a key in the corner.

So, teachers, if you’re using them in your classroom, you can reach students at all different levels and allow them to all do the project, but they all get to do it at their own level. And it’s not like, hey, these kids get to work on this project, and these kids are working on the less challenging one.

It kind of helps children build their sense of growth mindset because they’re all getting to do the baseball project, but it’s just at different levels. So, just an important note if you do use those in your classroom.

Annamarie: 

Well, you really have thought of everything. And again, I think teachers and parents could all benefit from using them with their kids.

So, we’ve talked a lot about parents working right along with their kids, but I think it’s also important to share ideas for independent activities. While we love the idea of families working together, we also know that parents are busy, and they also might want something a little more self-directed for their kids to work on at certain times.

I know you have a boot camp course for third graders. So, tell us a little bit about that along with other ideas you have for independent activities.

Melanie: 

Yeah, definitely. I think this is such an important thing to talk about because you’re right. While in the perfect world, parents would be able to help their kids with math all the time. But realistically, like I mentioned, time is a barrier. And a lot of parents over the summer, they’re still working, and they need their child to be able to be focused on something that doesn’t require total parent involvement or attention.

And so, that was kind of part of my reasoning for creating this Third Grade Math Boot Camp Course, and the course was designed to be used in the summer, but it also can be used anytime throughout the year. But this is definitely the time I like to tell parents about it because there are a lot of kids, and specifically for this course third graders, who really need summer school.

But many districts don’t have funding for summer school programs. Many parents can’t afford to do summer school programs, or you just don’t have the time. With summer sports and activities, it’s not realistic for kids to just be in summer school all the time.

And so, I wanted to make something that is, you know, completely self-directed and that kids can work on at their own pace, on their own schedule, whatever works best for them. And so, I designed a six-week totally virtual course that really focuses on whole number operations. So, addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division at the third grade level.

And what I do is I break it down by week, and each week is focused on one of those skills. And then there’s a special week in there for fluency and a special week in there for story problems and problem-solving strategies.

But each week includes instructional videos. So, me teaching basically reteaching, the third grade concepts, touching on the fact that the kids have already learned these things, but teaching them as if they’re learning from the beginning to really give them that reteach that many of our children need.

Because some of these skills, if they didn’t build deep conceptual understanding at the beginning, the rest of the class, I mean, we just keep on moving, and that can be really difficult if all of a sudden, they’re trying to build on those concepts.

So, I give a reteach of whatever those skills and strategies are, and I really dive into all the different visual models, all the hands-on models that they can use, and then also any of the algorithms and more efficient strategies that they can use as well.

And I really teach how to use them and why they work so that kids who are using going to use, let’s say it’s the place value addition or standard algorithm, we could call it, they understand what it means to regroup or rename 10 tens for 100, and so on.

There are also resources to go along with each week. So, there’s this summer math review, sort of like a boot camp. I don’t want to call it a worksheet, but it is, I mean, for parents if you’re listening, you can think of it as a worksheet. It is something that they can sit down, and they can do by themselves. They are expected to write down their answers and things like that.

But don’t worry, you don’t have to print stuff out. I have digital versions as well. So, they can do it on an iPad, they can do it on the computer. Whatever it is, they can put their answers in there too. 

And all the answer keys are included. So, parents, if you want to check your student’s work, you can do that. But that goes along with the teaching. So, just like they would have in class, they’re able to watch the video, learn from me teaching, answer some sample problems, and try a problem on their own.

There are places where they can troubleshoot if something doesn’t make sense. It says like, you know, go back to this step or rewatch this video or here’s something that can help with that.

And then it also gives other activities and fun things that you can do that are related to those concepts, like the Beach Road Trip Project is part of that course. So, it’s bringing in some of that real-world but really engaging and fun math.

So, I call it a boot camp, but boot camp doesn’t have to be boring. You’ll see me in these videos wearing, you know, fun crazy hat in one of them and in one of them I’m like wearing my sunglasses headed to the beach. I had way too much fun making this. I used to teach third grade math. So, I totally understand, you know, the level of those students.

But what I really liked about this is it is very student-directed. They can take as much time as they need. But there is also a parent component. So, I included videos in there for the parents or guardians to watch that just says like, hey, here’s what your child will be learning about this week, here are some of the things they might struggle with, and here’s some ways that you can help them.

I tried to make it fully equipped so that you can just you can have your child work on that. It basically can function like summer school. And I do put in there too, if you sign up for the course, I am always available by email, and I am more than happy to help. I’ve had people who have joined the course who’ve been like, hey, you know, my child needs extra help with X, Y, or Z. That’s what I love to do. I love helping families.

So, always know too if that’s something that you sign up for, or teachers, if you recommend a parent to sign their child up for it, I love helping with that, too. I’m always available if they need to troubleshoot something, but the system itself works really great.

There’s lots of hands-on manipulatives. But it’s all things that you would have at home. So, we’re using like, you know, pretzel rods, graham crackers, and Cheerios as a base 10 model, instead of making you go out and buy Base 10 blocks. Or counters can just be blueberries or whatever you have in your house.

But yeah, so I’m really proud of it. I think it’s something that really fills a void and something that a lot of families need right now, which is their third graders need summer school, but they either don’t have time, or they just don’t have access to a good summer school program, or any summer school program. And so, I’m kind of just trying to help solve that problem.

So, teachers, if you’re listening, definitely something to think about, like if you have students that, you know, would really benefit from that. I know, there are some states that are requiring summer school for children based on test scores, specifically at that third and fourth-grade level. And that’s kind of what inspired this too because I was teaching in Tennessee at the time, and I know there’s been a lot of things happening with that.

Also, you get access to it forever. Once you sign up, it doesn’t end. So, it’s $49.99 for the course, but then you just only pay that once, and then throughout the year, the kids can go back and watch those videos. They can be in fourth grade all of a sudden starting multiplication in fourth grade, and they’re like, oh, wait, how do I do this one skill from third grade? They can go back and watch the videos.

So, yeah, I just really wanted to make it something that’s really helpful for students, because that’s what it’s all about. It’s all about the kids, and I want them to be able to, you know, learn math, learn to love math, to have math make sense.

And if you’re not if you’re either not a third grade teacher or parent, or you’re just kind of not sure you need that but you’re looking for other resources, I do have a free downloadable resource on my website, which is how parents can help their kids with math at home. It’s just a pretty basic guide, but it includes really helpful details.

For example, helping without hovering. I give some tips on how you can help your child with math without like, you know, teaching them the way that you were taught when you grew up, or asking them too many questions, or guiding them to the right answer. I give some really helpful tips on like, here’s how you can help your child with math at home. Things that would really benefit them.

So, that’s just something you can download on my website at mathcoachconnection.com, and I’d love to share that with as many families as I can because I do think it’s really helpful for parents to know that.

Annamarie: 

Yes, and we will have all of those links in the show notes as well to make it easy, and I have two things to say about your course. Number one, if parents would get a tutor, it would probably be $50 an hour. So, you’re giving them a six-week course that never expires, that you have personal help with if needed. That’s an incredible deal for what you get.

And number two, you know, with Tennessee and summer school, it’s really only for reading right now. Math kind of gets the cold shoulder, even in the classroom, it’s always reading first reading first, and there are so many kids that never get math intervention because they have reading intervention five days a week. So, I love that you’re providing an option for those kids that need math intervention, but never get it.

Melanie: 

Yeah, absolutely.

Annamarie: 

Well, Melanie, I always end each episode with a teaching tip of the week, and I would love it if you could share a Teaching Tip of the Week for our audience.

Melanie: 

Yes, I would love to! My biggest thing, which you’ve probably figured out from this whole episode, is just make it engaging and bring the real world into the classroom as much as possible. If you can find examples of math in the real world or any subject you’re teaching, bringing those real-world examples in.

That’s how you get students to be excited about it, how you get that student buy-in, how you reach some of those reluctant learners, and just how you really prepare them for life outside the classroom. So, making it real world is my big piece of advice.

Annamarie: 

Yeah, that’s a great piece of advice. Well, you certainly are a wealth of knowledge. Thank you so much for being here and for sharing all of your tips and ideas with us. Before we wrap up, go ahead and tell us where the listeners can find you if they want to connect and learn more.

Melanie: 

Yeah, so definitely check me out on Instagram. I’m @mathcoachconnection on Instagram. That’s where you’ll find just daily, you know, when I’m walking around and seeing math in the real world, I always post about it. I always post what grade level it’s for, or how you can do it from K all the way through five. So, check me out on Instagram, for sure.

And then my website mathcoachconnection.com has all the links to all the things that I talked about today, too. It’s got a link to my podcast, which I didn’t even mention, but it’s ways that parents can help their kids with math at home. So, shocker! That’s what mine’s about too!

So anyway, I have all the helpful links there, and I update it regularly. So, you’ll see updates. You’ll see all my summer math guides will be on there. So yeah, check me out on Instagram or at my website, or you can always email me too, mathcoachconnection@gmail.com if you have questions. Thank you so much for having me!

Annamarie: 

You’re welcome. This was so much fun.