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Algebra really is cool.
Or is that algebra is really cool. Unfortunately the way we teach it makes it seem hard, and confusing and stupid.This is often where a student will receive their first devastating failing grade: their first “F” and from here many students see a cascade effect where suddenly ALL the grades begin to suffer. Let us endeavor to avoid this. As I traveled around the United States I found this to be a recurring theme, one of many. People often times women, but not always, would come up to me after a seminar or class or during a break and tell me that could point to the beginning of the end of their good grades or sometimes their academic career. That "F" in algebra, for me it didn't come until I hit calculus. When students come to me for help, often times I find we need to back up. If the student can't add and subtract numbers without the aide of their fingers, cannot answer times tables drills quickly and easily and/or have basic misconceptions about fractions...these must be addressed along with the algebra. Happily we can do all of this simultaneously, since math is a language we can use algebra to teach the all basic operations: addition and subtraction as well as multiplication and division. Further the use of manipulatives can completely eviscerate some misconceptions about algebra instantly. Combining like terms for example becomes completely obvious as does factoring trinomials and solving equations using "hero zero" and "no fun get back to one". This is my favorite subject to teach by far, because it can make the biggest difference, fastest. Once the student understands the concepts a test is easy because there only so many variations on the theme that can be asked. And because they now have cut it up into such tiny segments in an effort to make it understandable tests are often very narrow in scope indeed so ace-ing them becomes child's play. What ends up happening when the algebra is cut up into such tiny segments is the exact opposite of understanding: it becomes a “meaningless dance” because the segments are never put back together to form a cohesive whole. Often times I hear “just let me memorize how to do it so I can take the test” (and then forget it). When I get them to understand the concepts and visualize what they are doing... “F” to “A” is as natural as day following night. It would be nice to avoid the problems in the first place.
Go to my BLOG and you will see that I like to use algebra
to teach counting, addition and simple multiplication and division concepts. Algebra certainly helps make teaching math concepts easy, IF it's presented correctly. Under construction: soon that paragraph (and this page) will be full of hyper links to pages with more pictures and information and ultimately videos to describe what I mean. Info you can use to instantly help you understand key concepts and erase common misconceptions. You can also go HERE for a brief look at how to use algebra to teach basics like counting, adding, multiplication and more. 
"Math For Students dot com" is a website that offers help with
math and algebra
in the traditional way, note how they consider algebra to be a topic for 6th thru 8th graders. It is 100% symbol based, never uses a manipulative and may be of great use for those who have kids this age who are being confronted with algebra for the first time in their lives. It also is typical of what I am talking about here. Your child may benefit from the extra explanations.
Go Home from this algebra page. Go to Factoring Trinomials. But don't go there unless you have gone HERE first. "The human mind has never invented a labor-saving machine equal to algebra." ~Author Unknown
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