MEP Math

Adding alligator teeth to
the "greater than" sign.

We have discovered MEP Math. The "Mathematics Enhancement Programme" is a little-known British jewel available for free online.
Mia is using Year 1 (Kindergarten). There are 4 days of 45 minute lesson plans per week for 35 weeks, the 5th day being devoted to review (or skipping ahead, if applicable.) I actually have not found the lessons to take nearly that long in our one-on-one setting. Unless she wants to color-in everything on the whiteboard and her worksheet, or wants our counting song played ten times over, we're done in about 20 minutes.
So, what's special about this math program? Well, it's free, for starters (not counting your ink). It doesn't require $60 worth of manipulatives (they have printable cuisenaire rods and suggest using a set of small toys, buttons, shells or other objects as counters). It only requires one worksheet a day, unlike some math programs where all the work is in worksheets. It introduces kinesthetic ideas I hadn't thought of (knock on your desk as many times as I jump. Tell me the opposite word when you catch the ball).

Using shapes from our art box,
we compare quantity.

Year 1 starts with a review of preschool concepts, like "as many as" and position relations. Then it moves into counting and comparing small groups of objects. It uses the traditional greater than/less than/equal to signs. Some of the worksheet problems are logic puzzles. Then it works toward addition of small quantities. By the end of the year students are studying number bonds and calculations up to 20; multiple-step calculations (i.e. 1+4+5=10); addition using traditional numbers and roman numerals pre-algebra, and more advanced logic puzzles.

I printed off the first 30 pages of her practice book (black and white outlines--not too ink heavy), hole-punched them and put them in our "math binder." There's about one page per lesson. Cory saved the first 30 lesson plans as a PDF and downloaded them to my kindle--PDFs are bulky files for Kindles, so I'll delete it when we're ready to download the next 30 lessons. I do need to glance over the lessons in advance, sometimes I need to put something on the whiteboard (or BB as they abbreviate it), or it may call for number cards that I haven't printed yet.

Comparing height of 2 "classmates."