I received compensation from Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for writing this post. All opinions are my own.
Let me start by saying that I am NOT good at math. Never have been, never will be. I did okay with addition, subtraction and even multiplication. Come long division it was all over. I figured I could at least help my son get through the first couple years of school before I became useless. WRONG! Have you SEEN the math kids are doing in elementary school? By 3rd grade, I had to enlist my mom to help Jake with his homework. I was LOST.
How embarrassing is it to have to admit to my child that I don’t understand his math. I mean, he used to think that I knew everything! I miss that! I think the fact that they have a totally weird new way of teaching it and solving problems has at least something to do with it! Now Jake is in 4th grade. I expect that he’ll be doing trigonometry or something crazy like that by the end of the year. The point is, I can’t help him and I feel kind of inadequate. Fortunately, Go Math! Academy CAN help him!
Go Math! Academy: Making you feel less inadequate as a parent
Go Math! Academy is an online, at-home learning program based on Houghton Mifflin Harcourt’s enormously successful GO Math!™ textbook curriculum, used by over 7 million kids worldwide. . While I have no idea what Jacob will be learning this year, the experts at Go Math! Academy do know. They’ve designed a curriculum to match your child’s grade level. After I signed up, I added Jacob, then checked out what he would be learning. Um, I have to admit that I don’t know how to do half of these things!
I like to try out these things before Jacob does, so I can help him if he needs it. Turns out I am the one who needed help. I checked out the Perimeter and Area topic and didn’t even understand the question. Thankfully Jacob is much better at math than I am. He knew the answer. However, if he got stuck (like I did), he could have just hit the Help Me button. This gives you step-by-step instructions on how to solve the question.
Now, if this is all there was to it, Go Math! Academy would simply be a good tool for helping your child better understand math. While that’s great, we all know kids like a little more excitement, right? Well, if you complete sets of skills, you unlock fun games to play! If your child (or you) need more help, you can videos that explain things a lot more clearly than I ever could. I will admit, I watched a few when I realized I couldn’t even get the answers right to the easiest sections.
I am not even kidding about how difficult 4th grade math will be for me this year. I know that is probably sad. I should have paid closer attention when I was a child. I have other talents, though, I promise! I am super relieved to have Go Math! Academy, not just for my son but also for myself. It helps me get through tough homework questions and gives Jacob the chance to practice his skills on the computer. Jacob is a 21st Century Digital Boy (except he does know how to read… Tell me I have a few punk rock fans out there who get the reference?), so he learns best when he’s using the computer.
I love that Go Math! Academy is online with nothing to download, so he can also play it on his beloved Chrome Book while he’s lounging in his bed relaxing. If you or your child needs extra math help, or even if you want to give them a fun place to practice, Go Math! Academy is for you.
At just $9.99 per month, it’s definitely worth it for me. You can save by getting 6 months for $49.99 or one year for $79.99. Learn more here. Follow @HMHAcademy on Twitter,
Like Go Math! Academy on Facebook and Follow Go Math! Academy on Pinterest.
Are you good at math? What do you find most challenging about helping your child with math homework?
We use Time4Learning but I’m not really that impressed with it for the price, I think i’ll give Go Math a go and see how that works for us, great review.
This would be such a great tool for me. I am home schooling my youngest so anything that can help me to teach him is great.
My 7 year old struggles with math, so this is definitely something I want to look into. It sounds like a great program.
I could definitely have used this when my kids were still in school. I stopped understanding their math back in fifth grade!
I think for some kids and responsible parents using electronics for learning can be beneficial. Kiddo has some learning problems and we learned long ago that electronics were seen more as toys. So she would simply memorize things instead of actually learning them. So,when you tried to get her to do math and spelling on her own, she would not do very well. We had some issues with her grades this past year. Hopefully things will be a little easier for her this year.
I used to be able to help my daughter with math, but that common core really threw me for a loop. Now her dad has to do it when he gets home. This does sound like a fun way to learn math!
Common core makes me so mad. I don’t understand how they think it makes things easier. It’s a crazy system!
My daughter could use some help with her math. Thanks for showcasing this. Sounds like a good option for her!
I’m all for anything that makes Math easier. It has always been a difficult subject for me and I know a lot of students struggle with it.
I too am not a fan of math and would love to give this a try with my kids since I, like you couldn’t help them! LOL
Super cool I have to share this to my niece.
I’m not really good at Math so I have to double check myself when helping my daughter out with her Math homework. Thankfully she’s great at it.
My son is pretty good too. Better than me anyway. I’m hoping he gets my brother’s genes, that kid was good at everything.
I’ll have to look into this when my son is a little older. Thank you for sharing!
Definitely check it out. I believe it starts at Kindergarten, if not earlier.
This looks like a great way to learn math and reinforce skills. I know how to solve math problems and get to the correct answer but my kids would always say “we didn’t learn it that way”.
They are learning a whole different way than we did! I don’t understand, if you can get the right answer, why does it matter how you got there? I mean, unless you cheated of course. But if you take a different route and get to the same place, it’s a win in my eyes.
We use a similar program on the iPad. I love technology + learning for kids!
Oh, I wish there was something like this available when I was in school! I was horrible at math (still am) LOL
I hear you there! I pretty much lost it at long division and spent the rest of my school years struggling. I rocked English class though!
My son is a huge fan of math. He just loves me on the other hand had to study pretty hard to catch on.
This is fantastic for parents. I sure wish I would have had this tool to help with my younger son when he was in school. I will have to make sure my brother is aware of this for his little one.
thanks for this post. My son could totally use some help in the math department and honestly I am no help whatsoever
This is awesome. I’m laughing because once my kids hit high school, math questions were so out of the question for me. 😉
I homeschool, so I’m always looking for ways to make things more fun. I’ll have to check this out!
The Help Me button is awesome for those times you can’t figure it out! What a great program!
Sounds like a great tool! I am a lucky parent in this department. Both of my kids excell in math. My daughter has been taking college level math classes since she was in 9th grade and now as a senior tutors others.
Although I struggled with some topics, Math was my favorite subject in school. But I also am lost with the way they are teaching it these days. The terms and methodology are just confusing. Even hubby, who is a whiz at math, was no help.
We have always homeschooled our daughter(9). She gets stuck with division. This sounds like a GREAT program. I enjoyed algebra and calculus but could never get geometry and trig. We used to use Time4Learning but their software was outdated and will be trying paper textbooks/workbooks this year. But I will keep GO MATH ACADEMY in mind.