[email protected]

In a message dated 11/12/99 9:54:26 PM, [email protected] writes:

<<OK guys, I'm getting paniky here. I kept the books like Family Math, I

Hate Mathematics, and Mathematics for Smarty Pants and others laying around

here for about a month and dd never even picked one up! >>

I bought the Family Math book about a month ago myself, and have barely
looked at it so far. My plan (or hope) was that my son and husband and I
would do some of the activities together in the evenings. I know that I'm
gonna have to be the person that picks the first activity to start with and
invites the others to join me. I'm pretty sure that if it looks fun, they
will want to join me, but if it looks and smells educational they are going
to turn away.

(My son is probably younger than your daughter, which helps me keep panic at
bay. I may get tenser as he gets older.)

Betsy

[email protected]

In a message dated 11/12/99 9:54:26 PM, [email protected] writes:

<<Logic puzzles and games and mazes are a big hit in our house and

they sort of get the math juices flowing even if you are not actually

learning division or fractions or whatever.>>

We have some dice with more than 6 sides (10 sides, 12 sides and 20 sides)
that we got from a game store. (Also 4 sides) We've been substituting them
for regular dice in some of our games. This brings in Probability.

We play the Aristoplay Knights and Castles game, which resembles Parcheesi in
it's board layout. It takes an awfully long time to get around the board, so
we use one of the bigger dice to speed up the game. BUT, to start a man on
the board you must roll a 1 or a 6. Your odds of rolling these are better
with the 6 sided die. We start the game with that, and each player can
decide when he has enough players started that he wants to switch to using
the bigger die.

So I'm suggesting differently sized and shaped dice for stocking stuffers for
Christmas if you don't already own some.

Betsy