Up until about 2 years ago I had never even looked at Life of Fred, and had no clue what all the fuss was about. I bought 4 of the elementary math books to use with Krash last year as a supplemental review and we fell in love!
Dr. Schmidt recommends that all students up to 4th grade start with Apples and work their way through the entire elementary series. Krash is in 4th grade this year and finishing up the series this year {we hope}. Ladybug is in 1st grade and just started!
These books looked strange to me at first. Take a peek. Does this look like a math book to you?
Not really, huh? But it is math. presented in a engaging, purposeful and silly way. Our entire family now really enjoys Life of Fred math! The strangeness is what has really drawn us in. The characters are quirky, the stories are funny, and the math is practical.
We just started with Ladybug and I captured a bit of learning with her Dad during her first week. They sit together like this most days and will use a dry erase board to complete the problems at the end of each chapter.
Here’s a video I made showing them in action. It’s about 6 minutes long, giving you a peek into chapters 1 & 2 from Apples.
For more added fun, invite your dog!
The creator of the series, Dr. Stanley F. Schmidt is a former high school teacher and college professor who created the character Fred Gauss to give students real-world examples of how to use what they are learning. Kids love these adventure-focused and engaging stories. With 10 different Life of Fred books, they will have never-ending fun while developing their math skills.
You can find Life of Fred here on Amazon or here on Christian Book Distributors.