Basketball, Minor Gods, and using MEP

 After the final touches...

the new basketball hoop is up!

Lu started on the Minor Gods in Greek Mythology.

 

Pandora and Deucalion

And we're 3/4 the way through in our MEP Year 4 math.

I thought there was no way we were going to be able to finish the whole thing this year, but we've really gotten the hang of it. We were both so intimidated by it in the beginning. The worksheets look different than what we were used to. One worksheet would take us up to an hour to get through. Now, it usually doesn't take us more than 30 minutes.

Here's an example of a MEP exercise 

for understanding negative numbers.

If you decide to try MEP and feel frustrated at the beginning, don't give up, it'll come. Just give it time. It's like learning a new language - a new math language. I don't use the MEP lesson plans, only the practice books. For learning new concepts, we use this free resource. We do half an hour of each every day, but not back-to-back. The combination of the two has really strengthened Lu's (and my) math skills.

Here's a little video of Lu's very vocal math work -

I wonder a lot about whether Lu is good at math despite my math weakness, or if it is because of it. I guess, in a way, if someone who has such a hard time with it (me) finds a way to explain it, it will probably be an explanation that anyone can understand. I think I manage to break it down so much (because it's the only way I understand it), that it makes it super easy for Lu (who is much more of a natural in math) to understand. Or maybe it has nothing to do with me at all. One thing I know for sure is that math is definitely going more smoothly since I stopped worrying about it so much.