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I can’t remember how I first heard of the math series by Dr. Stanley F. Schmidt, called Life of Fred. But last year we were at a place in our math studies that wasn’t really great. The kids were making progress in their math skills, but they just weren’t really enjoying math.
Somewhere deep in my mind, I remembered that someone had mentioned the Life of Fred series and how it had changed their math studies for the better. I decided to order the first book, Life of Fred: Apples
The book arrived in the mail and I cracked it open to the first page, where I found this dedication.
I thought, If the author truly cared about bringing greater glory to God, then he would definitely be providing a wonderful curriculum in Life of Fred.
And that has exactly been our experience. Life of Fred is a DELIGHTFUL set of books about the life of Fred Gauss, a quirky math professor at Kittens University in Kansas. Yes, Fred is only five years old, and yes, he lives with his doll, Kingie, but you’ll have to get the book to find out about all of that.
Amazingly, because the kids are so taken by the story of Fred, they don’t realize that they are learning about math. The entire book is written almost like a word problem full of numbers and math skills, along with all kinds of other information. For example in this chapter, the kids learned about the difference between deciduous and evergreen trees. It was just a natural part of the story of Fred’s experience that day.
And then the best part… at the end of each chapter, there is a section called “Your Turn to Play.” This section reviews the skills introduced in the chapter practice math problems. But again, it is so enjoyable that the kids eagerly “play” along.
We are so thankful for the Life of Fred math series. It has been such a joy using it this year.
p.s Last night my second grader pointed to the sky and said, “There’s Orion’s belt.” I asked, “How did you know that?” And she answered, “I read about it in Life of Fred.” 🙂
