Why Math Facts?

How do you know if your child has mastered her math facts?

I know that there is a lot of talk about the impor­tance of mem­o­riz­ing our math facts. Is it real­ly as impor­tant as every­one says that it is? Does my child need to know what 6 x 8 is with­out a cal­cu­la­tor? Yes. 

Memorizing our math facts is more important than you realize. 

Math fact mem­o­riza­tion is not just math fact mem­o­riza­tion. It is rela­tion­ship build­ing and the foun­da­tion for crit­i­cal thinking. 

When your child enters pre alge­bra and has to solve for x, but is faced with 4x = 24. She should be able to tell me: 

1. that 4 x 6 = 24 there­fore, x must be 6. 

2. that if I divide 4x by 4, then I get the num­ber 1. 

These two points are intu­itive for chil­dren who under­stand the num­bers. A cal­cu­la­tor might tell your child that 4 x 6 = 24, but it won’t help your child ful­ly under­stand the rela­tion­ship between 4 and 6 and how to iden­ti­fy when we might see it in our problems.

So how do I tell if my child has mem­o­rized her facts? There are a few great resources, xtramath.org for exam­ple, that help show how sol­id our chil­dren have mem­o­rized these facts.