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By Understanding How and Why Math Works, Students Learn to Love Problem Solving

Author and educator Greg Tang’s workshops for Ranney students, parents and faculty have propelled community excitement around mathematical concepts and skills.
The revolutionary math educator, author and national speaker Greg Tang presented five workshops on Ranney School’s campus Dec. 9, 2015 to provide students, parents and faculty with a close-up and practical look at “Math Today.”
 
Mr. Tang travels the world teaching children and adults how to make math meaningful. “He generates an enthusiasm for math at all age levels by guiding understanding through logic,” explains Lower School Head Dr. Andrea Danial, who coordinated the workshop series. “For example, by understanding the question within a deep math problem, his approach helps students to develop flexibility in manipulating numbers so that they can simplify the math task and, ultimately, visualize the process.”
 
This approach, based on Singapore Math, has been folded into the Lower School curriculum this year as Math in Focus. It helps students develop conceptual understanding and the ability to use mental math, including conventional algorithms for higher grade levels, efficiently and accurately. “Students from Kindergarten through Grade 7 enjoyed Mr. Tang’s challenges and left his sessions talking about math with even more enthusiasm for problem solving and numeric puzzles,” said Dr. Danial.
 
In fact, many parents attending the evening session with Mr. Tang said their children came home after school talking about him and getting right to work on his math games! Parents left his session with a better understanding of what their children are doing in class, and how learning with models leads to the ability to solve more sophisticated problems and better understand the “why” and “how” behind traditional algorithms. Mr. Tang further explained to parents and faculty that understanding such concepts allows the children to develop greater number sense to recognize their answers as reasonable or not, and to then be able to “see” where their misunderstanding may be. 
 
“The faculty workshop presented a timely professional development opportunity for our teachers as well, and Mr. Tang was impressed with the amount of training our school provides for them to dig deeper into not only how and why Math In Focus works, but also to see where their work supports the math our students will face in upper levels,” added Dr. Danial.
 
Mr. Tang’s books and games can be found online at http://gregtangmath.com.
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Ranney School

235 Hope Road
Tinton Falls, NJ 07724
Tel. 732.542.4777
Our mission is to know and value every child, nurturing intellectual curiosity and confidence, and inspiring students to lead honorably, think creatively, and contribute meaningfully to society. 

We envision Ranney School as a nurturing learning community, in which families, faculty, alumni, and all of Ranney’s constituents collaborate to know and value every child, foster individual talents, sustain powerful connections between children and adults, and graduate resilient, globally-minded citizens.