Free Math Tutoring Videos, Online Practice and Worksheets

Whether you are a traditional teacher, home-school teacher, parent, student, or an adult who simply wants to brush up on math, you should be taking advantage of two websites that provide invaluable math tools. Khan Academy (khanacademy.org) and Math Master (mathmaster.org) both have similar missions: they want to improve education worldwide by offering free tutorials, exercises and worksheets. The motto from Khan Academy says it best, "A free world-class education for anyone anywhere."

About Khan Academy
Sal Khan is the founder of Khan Academy. He quit his job as a hedge fund manager to start this free, online academy. He has three degrees from MIT and an MBA from Harvard. It's his voice you'll hear on all the videos-over 1200-that he has created. Khan got the idea for the website after helping his young nephew understand various math concepts. He thought it would be great if everyone worldwide had access to this kind of assistance without charge. He has been featured on many television shows and has been interviewed frequently. You can watch PBS News Hour's video on the Khan Academy here. Bill Gates is impressed with this operation as well. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation now help to support it.

The Khan Academy Videos
These videos can be used individually or with an entire class. The video library is extensive: pre-school through college. Math is the main focus; however, science, history and finance have been added as well. The videos are approximately 10 minutes each and each one focuses on a different skill. Khan narrates them: it's as if he's standing behind your back-the viewer never sees him. Kahn starts with a visual representation of the concept and moves to the abstract. The videos are very explanatory in nature.

The Khan Academy Online Practice Exercises
Once a skill video has been viewed, the student is ready to try practice exercises. Numbers are randomly generated, so the amount of possible practice questions is infinite. The student receives a question and can either answer it or click on "I'd like a hint." Hints are given one at a time. If he has no clue what the answer is, he might want to go back to the video explanation. Answering 10 questions in a row indicates proficiency, and the student is given the option to move on. Students can earn badges for their accomplishments: they range from common ones to the more difficult, legendary badges.

Khan Academy's Tools for Teachers
This is an excellent, free resource for schools. Sal Khan's goal is for teachers and parents to act as "coaches." If a teacher incorporates this program, there are many useful facets. The teacher can see at a glance which students are "stuck." Each student's graph is color coded: green indicates mastery of a skill, blue indicates that she probably has it, but needs practice; red indicates that she's stuck and needs the teacher's help. This frees the teacher to concentrate on those who really need it. Data is provided showing what each student accomplished in class-and for homework. It even relays the amount of time a student spends on videos and practice exercises.

About Math Master
The creator of Math Master shared his motivation for starting the website with me. His daughter was getting good grades in math, but he thought she lacked practice at school. He created worksheets and required her to practice math 15 minutes a day. Within a year, she was 3 grade levels ahead of her class. He wanted other people to get the same benefits as his daughter, so he released his worksheets to the public. Even though there are math sites out there already, many are not flexible-and users often have to pay for them. Mathmaster.org plans to continually add worksheets for all levels to its database.

The Math Master Worksheets
The worksheets on mathmaster.org are a perfect complement to many of the Khan Academy videos. (Khan's videos are housed on the Math Master site as well.) The worksheet topics range from coloring shapes and simple counting to algebra and geometry. The supply of worksheets is endless: the worksheets are customized and created as you request them. For example, in "advanced division," you can choose the number of problems you'd like to print, the number of digits you want in the divisors and dividends, whether or not you want remainders, and whether or not you want decimal places. You can even choose to have the problems placed either horizontally or vertically on the page. Answer keys are available. Teachers want to individualize instruction as much as possible, and this site makes the job easier. Students who are having difficulty with a concept can watch the related video and then print out a worksheet on the topic for practice. Teachers can use them for in-class practice, homework or tests.

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