Need help with Ds showing his math work

[AnitaMcC]

I posted this on the high school forum too.

Okay, how do I teach my son how to show his math work? Ds14 is doing Algebra 2 and he has never learned how to do his work on paper. In ps they just let him give the answers and go on and for most part he aced the tests.

He doesn't always know how he gets his answers he just does them and usually he is right!!!! I just don't know if he truly understands the concepts although he sure seems to be able to get the answers doing it his way.

There are times he gets a wrong answer and I have no idea how he did the problem to help him correct it... and he can't tell me!!!! And then he gets frustrated and "assumes" the book or I am wrong-LOL. Much of the time it is simple mistakes in his calculations.

By the way Ds has Asperger Syndrome so it isn't simple as getting him to just write it down. He often doesn't know how he knows the answer... he just knows the answer. He can see it in his head, but he can't put it on paper nor explain it to me.

I worry because in higher math, a student needs to show their process of solving problems and it can take a full page writing down one problem. But he can't even show his work in high school algebra.

I wonder if I need to get him a specialist to help him??? Ever heard of a tutor to help a kid figure out how to show he knows math without knowing how he did it????? Confusing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank you for any help you can offer!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!

[Carol in Cal.]

Finally I have gotten through to her as she does multi step problems in the last part of pre-algebra, which is really early algebra 1 material.

The way I did it was to take every single problem that I demonstrated to her, and wrote it out like a geometry proof, in two columns. One column says what I did in words, and the other shows the modified equation after that operation.

Then I asked her to walk me through some problems like that--not every single one, but a sample of them. I would ask her, "What are you REALLY doing when you do this operation?" I started to give her partial credit when she got something wrong but had approached the problem properly, and she wanted to start getting more of that, so she got a little motivated at that point. She had a tendency to skip those steps and then go wrong with computation, like cross multiplying in her head and then setting up the final fraction upside down.

Here is a very simple example:

18X - 14 = 19 + 3X
18X = 33 + 3X Add 14 to both sides of the equation
15X = 33 Subtract 3X from both sides of the equation
X = 33/15 Divide both sides of the equation by 15
X = 2 1/5 Reduce the answer

[lgm]

Sounds like he's not used to providing solutions to the grader. He'll need to be taught how.

If you're revewing Alg. I at the beginning of II, you can fill in his blank spots - likely most of them are the properties but some will be the vocabulary to go along with manipulating the symbols.

[Brooke3193]

I have 2 ideas...

1) If it is that easy for him to do the math in his head, then maybe he would be better off learning to show his work with more challenging math. For example, maybe asking him to show his algebra II work would be like asking me to show my work on taking half of 46. My response would be "Good grief, there's no *work.* It just *is.*" Granted, there is work....long division would be one way, a picture would be another, but creating the work would be a whole lot harder than getting the answer....more of a learning experience perhaps, but not necessarily the best place to start if what I am trying to learn is how to show my work.

2) You say he can't tell you how he got the answer. But, I assume you are asking him *after* he has done the problem. Maybe a starting point to him being able to write down his work would be for him to talk out loud while he is doing the problem and you write it down for him. Then, together, you can look back over it and he can see how his thoughts turned into verbal words and then into the written word. Gradually turn that into him writing it for himself. Maybe a step in the process would be for you to record him saying what he is doing and then having him listen to the tape and write down the steps.

I would also add to the above idea that it might be worth discussing with him whether he can *see* the problem in his head as he is doing it. I see math problems when I'm doing them, just as I see the spelling of words when I say them. It's like a big chalkboard (ok, I'm old, these days it would be a big whiteboard) inside my forehead. The best I can describe it is that when I am talking to someone and say their name, I would not think that "Jon" and "John" have the same name. Math is a little harder to explain, but I can definitely see a problem as though it is being written across the sky by an airplane or whatever. If he does that, maybe he could "copy" what he sees onto paper.....although when I see a problem, I don't always see my scratchwork so maybe this whole paragraph was a waste of my time and yours. :glare: