Parent Guide For Grade 5 Mathematics (Page 2 of 2) in pdf

TALK WITH YOUR CHILD’S TEACHER

When you talk to your child’s teacher, don’t worry about covering everything.

Instead, keep the conversation focused on the most important topics for your

child. In fifth grade, you may ask your child’s teacher questions such as:

• How will my child be expected to show his/her work?

• What are some areas where my child is excelling? Where does my child

need extra help?

If you are concerned that your child is struggling with math, don’t postpone

talking with his/her teacher. Open the conversation by asking if the teacher

has observed any signs of confusion or frustration. Ask if your child has

mastered addition, subtraction, multiplication and division of decimals and

is competent adding and subtracting fractions.

Help your child engage in “productive struggle,” or, in other words, keep going if a math task seems to take too long or be

too hard. Encourage honest effort, praise him/her for persevering and share in the satisfaction of eventual success.

SUPPORT LEARNING AT HOME

You can encourage learning mathematics at home in ways that are fun for you and your child. Try these ideas after

school, on weekends and during the summer:

Ask your child to keep track of his/her allowance

Search newspapers and magazines or the

over time—to keep a record of how money has

internet for charts, tables, graphs and

been received, spent and/or how much has been

especially “infographics” that contain numerical

saved for future use. Be sure your child is using

information. Discuss specific information with

decimals to denote dollars and cents.

your child.

When filling the gas tank, have your child observe

Investigate problem sets, games and brain

how gallons of gas accumulate and correspond

teasers from the National Council of Teachers of

to cost in dollars and cents. Ask your child to use

Mathematics (NCTM) at .

division and calculate the cost per gallon.

Find the locations of sites of interest on a road

When shopping at the grocery store have your

map or atlas using the coordinates from the map.

child hunt for the lowest unit prices for a product

you’re purchasing.

Talk to your child’s teacher or principal to learn more great ideas to support learning at home.

Download the complete Mathematics Florida Standards and other resources for parents at

Questions? Contact

Parent Guide For Grade 5 Mathematics Page 2