Guest Author - Marci Ann Peterson

My daughters, Miriam and Emma, love Math Monsters and I must admit, I do as well. Math Monsters is geared towards the PreK-2nd grade crowd, that teaches and reinforces math principles in an interesting and easy to recall way. Here in Southern California, at least with Charter cable it’s only on once a week, on Mondays, and it’s only 15 minutes long. We wish that it was on more often!

I have found as a homeschooling mom, that starting our week with Math Monsters and using the teacher’s guide gives us a great jumping off point in our math lessons for the week. I highly recommend this show no matter the age of your child or schooling preference.

Not only are the characters named after recognizable math symbols but they are actually shaped that way. Follow the characters, Addison who is the addition symbol , Mina who is the Subtraction symbol, Multiplex the two-headed multiplication symbol, and lastly Split whom you guessed it is the division symbol, as they explore the world of math concepts.

Through the hilarious antics of the characters your child will learn mathematical concepts such as collecting data, estimating, keeping track of time, making maps, and so much more. There are many times where the concept that was taught spurs a whole conversation on solving math problems which will then lead to a whole unit study on that particular concept. For example when we watched the show on collecting data my girls were so intrigued with the idea that they made their own surveys so they could collect their own data. And after the data was collected we talked about how to organize the data with different graphs and charts. They will forever remember how to collect and organize data.

The show will start out with the monsters going about their day and then encountering a problem that they need to solve, teaching your children that you will use math every day. I love the fact that they go through some trial and error before they come up with a way to solve the problem they are facing, a lot of times I will pause the show at this point and talk with my girls about the problem and what they think they should do to solve the problem. (It’s very exciting for them when they come up with the right solution on their own before the monsters figure it out.) And then they are able to solve the problem. At the end there is a “real life” segment where a real person will come on and go over how they use the math concept that was taught that day in their real every day life, introducing our children to careers where math is used to complete the job.

What a wonderful way to teach and prepare our kids to be in the real world and how to use math!

Check out the Data Collecting Episode for yourself by clicking below.