Unschooling Maths: why, what & how

It just looks different. You can do it! Here are some resources.

Oct 16, 2023

The question is often: But What About Maths?

Are we just going to let Maths go, or like, can we unschool except for Maths? And HOW DO WE UNSCHOOL MATHS?!?

Can we use curriculum or make Maths non-negotiable and still be self-directed?

Well - first off, you can do whatever you want!

Don’t let anyone tell you there is a “correct” way to do this. There simply is not. You and your child and your family are unique and you have unique reasons for doing what you do. You are choosing to educate your child, or live without school, and you can do it however seems to work best for you and them!

That said, my Monday posts offer practical thoughts and resources to support you with unschooling, so that’s what I’m going to do.

It is worth deschooling your ideas around Maths

When we started home educating, Maths was something we did every weekday morning, without fail. We “got it out the way” so we could then.. I don’t know, enjoy life?

That only worked for a while, until my children realized they could say no. Because once you get deeper into consent-based education, they will realize they can push back on all our “musts” and “shoulds”.

And that’s when I really started deconstructing some of our assumptions around what learning Maths needs to look like, what is actually necessary and what is not, and our general assumptions around how children “should” learn.

A Mathematician’s Lament is a short book that helped me to reframe the way Maths should be approached and taught, and you can read it here for free. It critiques the way Mathematics is taught in school and explains why it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to ignore the big ideas in favor of teaching its separate parts.

Another important reframe which I heard from several high school Maths teachers, is that it’s not that hard to catch up. And, it’s literally never too late. My friend, fellow homeschool mother and Maths tutor has taught adults the whole of Mathematics needed to take the SATs in a few months of intense study.

I’ve heard stories of teen unschoolers catching up in Maths in a few months or a year, and I’m also currently watching my 12-year old engage with Maths after a few years of no formal Maths learning. She is excited, enthusiastic, and figuring out the ways she learns best.

I say no formal learning, but the truth is that Maths is everywhere if we learn to see it. My 9 year old does no “sit-down” Maths learning, he is not interested in the least. But we use Maths almost every day - we handle money, keep score at golf, play number games, measure things, go grocery shopping, calculate times and distances.

Only yesterday we were looking up books on amazon and he wanted to see the percentages for each starred review of the books I was adding to my Wish list. We noticed that the more times a book had been reviewed, the more likely there would be a range of star ratings. One book had been reviewed only once and had a 5 star rating and we discussed why in this case, 100% of reviews being 5 stars didn’t necessarily mean it’s an excellent book!

In the spirit of deschooling Maths, I’m going to share a few resources that might help:

These are two podcast episodes about unschooling Maths that I’ve found immensely helpful:

Honey I’m Homeschooling the Kids: Learning Maths with Monica Robertson (retired Maths teacher and homeschool parent)

Another HIHTK episode on using board games instead of worksheets.

This is an interesting podcast on making children learn maths just in case, Sue Elvis makes some good points.

Last but not least, this blog post by Sara, at Happiness is Here, has a great list of ideas on how to unschool Maths and actually enjoy it!

But WHY should we unschool Maths?

I’ll be honest. A part of me would feel a tad relieved if my children agreed to just follow an easy low-key Maths curriculum.

BUT, my values will always come before my need to have my children do xyz. This doesn’t mean I don’t talk to them about how understanding mathematical thinking and how numbers work matters. This doesn’t mean I don’t expose them to maths in all its many forms. But it does mean that it’s not going to look the way I want it to look for the simple reason that in our family, we do not force, manipulate, cajole or bribe. We do not reward for “desirable” behaviour.

We support our children in sitting in their own personal power and autonomy and knowing who they are and how they want to show up.

For me, it’s that simple.

If you have ND kids with a super sensitive nervous system, it might also be a case of avoiding extreme dysregulation, because nobody learns when they aren’t in their zone of regulation. This doesn’t mean we don’t do hard things. It means we understand our children’s window of tolerance and we support them to gradually expand it. But we also support them in knowing when to pull back, and we know when some things just aren’t going to work, at least not for now.

This is such a great podcast episode that explains the window of tolerance and the comfort and learning zones.

So HOW do we do it then?

You will absolutely find the way that works for you, but I can offer some resources that might help.

A note on links & getting ahold of resources: we got a lot of our homeschool resources from friends or buy nothing groups. Thrift stores can be great too if you are somewhere where this is accessible. I try as much as I can to make or buy local. Where possible I do not link to amazon, but some of the links below are amazon affiliate links.

Manipulatives

These are great for all ages but in my experience, they are particularly helpful for younger children. One of my children was not into manipulative, the other one was! So as always, it’s very personal.

These are some we enjoyed:

Mathlink cubes.

This is one my kids are currently enjoying for multiplication - cheap and simple!

We had a lot of fun with magnetic pattern blocks

Magna Tiles are still a favorite with my children, truly versatile and ageless!

As an ex-Montessori educator, I love Montessori materials! But I’ll be honest - my kids were not always fans, and at home some of them can be pricey and just sit on shelves sadly ignored, especially if you’re not sure how to support your child to use them. That said, my children enjoyed this 100 board (you can also just print out a 100 square on paper), and Montessori Math beads (you can find these on amazon and on several Montessori shops).

Loose parts play. This is probably the most underrated manipulative! We have used stones, pebbles, shells, twigs, leaves, marbles, bottle tops, pom poms, and more. The book Project-based Homeschooling by Lori Pickert has a bunch of great example for loose parts play.

My children really loved our very simple Abacus I got from a local shop.

Games

Games are a favorite over here. These are some of our fave number-based and maths games.

Dino Math Tracks - my kids have learned about place value from this game alone

Blokus - good for younger kids too, all about strategy, numbers and shapes

Check the fridge

Sleeping Queens

Proof! - this one has several levels you can play at and ways to modify it for all levels

Cooperative Games- you’ll find a long list here. Not all of them are Math games but these are especially good for kids who have a hard time competing.

Uno is a classic!

We are currently enjoying Adsumundi for creative mental Math

Zeus on the Loose - mental addition and subtraction, a favorite!

Apps

Mathseeds - really good for very early mathematicians up until Grades 2 or 3 I believe.

Math Tango - this is great for mental maths and has helped my kids consolidate multiplication and division. It’s not great in terms of explaining HOW or WHY to do things, though.

Kahn Academy - this has been used on and off, some of the videos aren’t particularly fun but it’s a good one to have to go deeper into explanations and step by step instructions.

Animal Math - this one is for younger child, was briefly enjoyed by mine.

BrainPop - this is such a great resource for all topics, and there are some Maths videos too.

Everyday Life (beyond baking!).

I’m going to share a few ways we bring Maths into everyday life. Because we don’t have a specific time to learn Maths, it sort becomes something we just do every day. I’ve noticed my children will seek out opportunities to practice new maths skills or calculate something, because they can!

Grocery shopping. This works better with older kids, when it actually becomes semi-fun to go grocery shopping! My children have a budget for snacks each and they need to stay within it each week. They also help me to shop for the family by comparing prices and making decisions around what to buy.

Pocket Money. My children receive weekly pocket money just for being their awesome selves, because I believe they deserve to have some spending power of their own. And, the added bonus is they get a lot of practice around saving and spending their own money.

Golf. (And sport in general, playing and watching.) L loves to play golf with his dad and the kids both love watching golf. There is a lot of chat about distances, scores, calculations, speed, and other things I’ll never understand!

Just going places. You need to make an intentional effort (or at least I do, because Maths is generally always VERY far from my mind) to centre mathematical thinking in your life. I can’t do this every day, but I do it a lot because I know that this is how we engage with real, practical mathematics. When we go places we figure out times and how long it’s going to take us, and when we need to leave. We work on what route to take, public transport, check opening times, look at maps. I might comment on architecture, shapes, street numbers, distances, how long it takes to get places, the speed of something, the possibilities are literally endless! The more I try to see mathematical thinking all around me, the more my children can see it too.

Minecraft & Lego. There’s so much spatial awareness, strategy and counting/figuring out in both of these activities. Don’t discount them!

Car Maths (or bus or train). When we used to drive around a lot, I used to do car Maths with the kids. This basically involved finding numbers when they were very little, and then adding up or subtracting numbers on car license plates, and eventually multiplying numbers.

Sewing or crafting. I used to do a lot of quilting and it was fun to involve my children in the measuring of squares and triangles. We all craft a lot, which involves a lot of figuring out, measuring, cutting out and sticking together. We use books or YouTube videos to make things like origami, or cardboard creations.

Imaginary Play. The children often bring maths into their imaginary play. For example, they created a hotel for all their cars and stuffed animals. This involved a lot of pricing for the rooms and the hotel restaurant, the creation of a menu with prices, and lots of figuring out in order to make space for everyone to stay at the hotel.

Other resources to consider

Maths in Art book - this is one my artsy kids have loved.

Bedtime Maths - there are 3 books in this series that includes stories and puzzles ranked by ability. My children love doing these!!

Outschool classes- My children have taken a few over the years, on and off. Worth seeing if there’s something your child might be into

Wild Math - this is a curriculum that is super flexible. We used it the first year we homeschooled and it’s full of hands on ideas for doing Maths outdoors.

Math you can Play books - There are 5 in the series, full of games to learn maths.

Thanks for reading, share yours in the comments below if you feel like it!!