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Life of Fred College Prep Set #1
Life of Fred: Fractions
The Human Face of Fractions
If you know your addition and multiplication tables by heart, your next step is to get to know Fred.
In this book (Life of Fred: Fractions) and the next book (Life of Fred: Decimals and Percents) you can learn everything you need to know to begin algebra!
In one morning, our hero:
Teaches a class at the university
Buys a bicycle
In his office, he hurts his foot and is taken to the hospital.
...and that's just the beginning of his day!
Less Than, Billion, Cardinal and Ordinal Numbers, Diameter and Radius, Savings and Expenses, Definition of a Fraction, Sectors, Comparing Fractions, Reducing Fractions, Adding and Subtracting Fractions, Common Denominators, Roman Numerals, Least Common Multiples, Improper Fractions, Lines of Symmetry, Division by Zero, Circumference, Multiplying Mixed Numbers, Commutative Law, Canceling, Definition of a Function, Area, Unit Analysis, Division of Fractions, Geometric Figures, Estimating Answers.
If you know your addition and multiplication tables by heart, your next step is to get to know Fred.
In this book (Life of Fred: Fractions) and the next book (Life of Fred: Decimals and Percents) you can learn everything you need to know to begin algebra!
In one morning, our hero:
Teaches a class at the university
Buys a bicycle
In his office, he hurts his foot and is taken to the hospital.
...and that's just the beginning of his day!
Less Than, Billion, Cardinal and Ordinal Numbers, Diameter and Radius, Savings and Expenses, Definition of a Fraction, Sectors, Comparing Fractions, Reducing Fractions, Adding and Subtracting Fractions, Common Denominators, Roman Numerals, Least Common Multiples, Improper Fractions, Lines of Symmetry, Division by Zero, Circumference, Multiplying Mixed Numbers, Commutative Law, Canceling, Definition of a Function, Area, Unit Analysis, Division of Fractions, Geometric Figures, Estimating Answers.
192 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 2007
20 people are currently reading
143 people want to read
About the author
Stanley F. Schmidt
94 books64 followersStanley F. Schmidt is an educator. He began teaching high school teacher at the age of 22, and later taught in a college.
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Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews
June 6, 2008
This book is so amazing. Do yourself a favor and go through it and then start your children on it if they have their math facts down solid. When you are finished go to the next level, which is decimals and percents, and then onto beginning Algebra, and so on and so one. The author says that when you finish all the books in the series you could enter college as a junior, majoring in math. They have intermediate algebra, then geometry, then trigonometry, then calculus, then statistics. This comes under the living book category. You are taught through a story and real life situations where you really do use the math you are taught.
April 30, 2022
I love reading the stories in Life of Fred. What a way to make math fun.
April 19, 2018
Son read aloud to me and enjoyed it. Had planned on him reading a chapter a day during lessons while discussing the problems verbally. He couldn't get enough of the story and the problems were simple to him. He could have finished the book in one sitting along with all the problems but held him back as long as possible.
April 9, 2020
3.5 stars. This book did a better job of teaching my child than I thought it would in the beginning. I thought it was moving too quickly, but in the end I think it gave a pretty good foundation, especially when combined with the associated Zillions book. We did have to go more slowly and spend more time on a few chapters, but overall, it was impressed.
January 2, 2018
This is a cute, fun way to refresh your knowledge of some math! I loved Fred and want to continue on to the next books soon!
September 19, 2022
Funny, quirky, and does a good job of helping my daughter with her math.
February 13, 2015
After using Saxon Math for 9 grades of homeschooling, my son just wasn't enjoying math at all. He began to fall behind once we got to algebra. While Saxon Math is a thorough math program with plenty of review, I can't really say it inspires anyone to love math. So after reading a lot of positive reviews about the Life of Fred series, we decided to give it a try, mainly out of desperation.
First off, these books are FUN! There is a narrative that runs through the series about a 5 1/2 year boy named Fred who is a math genius who teaches at Kittens University. He has many little adventures that any kid would care about. The narrative is funny and very kid-friendly-- imagine someone like Douglas Adams writing math books, and you'll have an idea what these books are like. Fred's adventures always tie in with some practical math application in each chapter, making the math problem-solving accessible to anyone's everyday life, too.
There are only 32 chapters in this book, and each chapter tends to have fewer than 10 math problems to solve. The exercises aren't labelled as "exercises"-- they are called, "Your Turn to Play." The tests aren't called tests, but "Bridges" to the next lesson (these Bridges come every 5 lessons). The student must get at least 9 out of 10 problems correct on the Bridges before being able to go on to the next lesson (if he doesn't pass, there are five Bridges offered, each with 10 problems, if the student needs more practice). The book includes an answer key and every problem is worked out (unlike Saxon which only gives the final answer in their answer keys... you have to buy the CD-ROM to see the problems worked out in full). I really appreciate this! Another plus is that these books are highly affordable.
As an example of one of the problems (from ch. 20): When Joe went out fishing with Darlene, she packed two baskets. One of them was their lunch-- five baloney sandwiches. The other basket had the bait in it-- zillions of little meal worms. Joe accidentally ate 6/17 of the basket with the bait. What fraction of the bait basket did he leave uneaten? Just the kind of math problem kids love!
The author is very anti-"drill & kill" and believes in only supplying enough math problems to get the job done. I honestly don't know if it is enough (I'm the type that had to work both the even and odd problems in school, even if the teacher only assigned the odd problems, just to get it to stick in my craw-- and even then, it didn't always stick for long). I guess we'll see once we reach the algebra book in the series, when concepts become more abstract. I'm working through these books with my son. We were able to fly through this first book in 3-4 weeks time, typically doing 3 lessons per day since the first book was largely review for us. Though this is called a fractions book, I was surprised how few of the lessons actually dealt with actual fractions... the author sort of likes to circle around and sidle up to the concept, then circle around again, to deflect intimidation. He also likes the student to use his brain and figure some concepts out by himself, rather than being told what to do all the time. He also loves his footnotes, which are often funny and include quirky tidbits, such as what an onomatopoeia is (he's well-rounded in his approach to education and does not teach math in isolation). Overall, I recommend the book, especially to those who are more word-oriented than numbers-oriented. My son often asks to do math first now, which never happened with Saxon. But it remains to be seen if this will be enough... we plan to use Saxon as a back-up, in case we need extra practice (and I pray we won't ever need it).
First off, these books are FUN! There is a narrative that runs through the series about a 5 1/2 year boy named Fred who is a math genius who teaches at Kittens University. He has many little adventures that any kid would care about. The narrative is funny and very kid-friendly-- imagine someone like Douglas Adams writing math books, and you'll have an idea what these books are like. Fred's adventures always tie in with some practical math application in each chapter, making the math problem-solving accessible to anyone's everyday life, too.
There are only 32 chapters in this book, and each chapter tends to have fewer than 10 math problems to solve. The exercises aren't labelled as "exercises"-- they are called, "Your Turn to Play." The tests aren't called tests, but "Bridges" to the next lesson (these Bridges come every 5 lessons). The student must get at least 9 out of 10 problems correct on the Bridges before being able to go on to the next lesson (if he doesn't pass, there are five Bridges offered, each with 10 problems, if the student needs more practice). The book includes an answer key and every problem is worked out (unlike Saxon which only gives the final answer in their answer keys... you have to buy the CD-ROM to see the problems worked out in full). I really appreciate this! Another plus is that these books are highly affordable.
As an example of one of the problems (from ch. 20): When Joe went out fishing with Darlene, she packed two baskets. One of them was their lunch-- five baloney sandwiches. The other basket had the bait in it-- zillions of little meal worms. Joe accidentally ate 6/17 of the basket with the bait. What fraction of the bait basket did he leave uneaten? Just the kind of math problem kids love!
The author is very anti-"drill & kill" and believes in only supplying enough math problems to get the job done. I honestly don't know if it is enough (I'm the type that had to work both the even and odd problems in school, even if the teacher only assigned the odd problems, just to get it to stick in my craw-- and even then, it didn't always stick for long). I guess we'll see once we reach the algebra book in the series, when concepts become more abstract. I'm working through these books with my son. We were able to fly through this first book in 3-4 weeks time, typically doing 3 lessons per day since the first book was largely review for us. Though this is called a fractions book, I was surprised how few of the lessons actually dealt with actual fractions... the author sort of likes to circle around and sidle up to the concept, then circle around again, to deflect intimidation. He also likes the student to use his brain and figure some concepts out by himself, rather than being told what to do all the time. He also loves his footnotes, which are often funny and include quirky tidbits, such as what an onomatopoeia is (he's well-rounded in his approach to education and does not teach math in isolation). Overall, I recommend the book, especially to those who are more word-oriented than numbers-oriented. My son often asks to do math first now, which never happened with Saxon. But it remains to be seen if this will be enough... we plan to use Saxon as a back-up, in case we need extra practice (and I pray we won't ever need it).
May 8, 2014
I'm going to review this for Rainier.
LoF is okay. I think the strength of the program is in the problem sets and talking over stuff together after you read. There is very little to very poor actual teaching in the text itself. If you just want to hand it over to your child to read, there is very little info to be gleaned from the story. It might be a fun story (I personally disagree), but within the story there is little math and no explanation of math. The story just adds a lot of fluff. I like the problem sets though. Maybe not more than Singapore word problems, but as well as. The problem sets are almost all word problems, so I think if you are using this as your only curriculum, you would need to add in just a bit more practice. There was very little new material in this book for Rainier. Dividing fractions, canceling, and reviewing long forgotten/un-used roman numerals were the only new concepts. Had he not already been pretty good with fractions, I think this book would be a horrible starting point. But as is, it was a nice review. I don't know how fast it is designed to be gone through. Rain raced through the majority of it in one week...then we took a long hiatus with it before we finished it off. All in all these are books that need a teacher to sit down and explain concepts if it is your first time through. Otherwise they give nice little problem sets and kids feel drawn to the story. Would never use these as a stand alone even though they claim to be just that.
LoF is okay. I think the strength of the program is in the problem sets and talking over stuff together after you read. There is very little to very poor actual teaching in the text itself. If you just want to hand it over to your child to read, there is very little info to be gleaned from the story. It might be a fun story (I personally disagree), but within the story there is little math and no explanation of math. The story just adds a lot of fluff. I like the problem sets though. Maybe not more than Singapore word problems, but as well as. The problem sets are almost all word problems, so I think if you are using this as your only curriculum, you would need to add in just a bit more practice. There was very little new material in this book for Rainier. Dividing fractions, canceling, and reviewing long forgotten/un-used roman numerals were the only new concepts. Had he not already been pretty good with fractions, I think this book would be a horrible starting point. But as is, it was a nice review. I don't know how fast it is designed to be gone through. Rain raced through the majority of it in one week...then we took a long hiatus with it before we finished it off. All in all these are books that need a teacher to sit down and explain concepts if it is your first time through. Otherwise they give nice little problem sets and kids feel drawn to the story. Would never use these as a stand alone even though they claim to be just that.
March 26, 2011
Unique, intelligent, fun approach to math. Buy from author's website for cheapest prices; the books are inexpensive, and well worth the cost. I supplement with other instruction for practice and cementing concepts, but these do give thorough coverage of the important skills. These books do not drill kids to death with endless problems of the same thing, but give interesting, challenging problems that check for understanding of the skill, all within a story that keeps kids reading. They are great for independent learners as well. At the end of a section there are multiple, short "bridge" tests. In order to move on, the kid needs to pass one of those tests. If they don't make it the first try, there are more short tests they can have a go at to cross the bridge.
One of the best things about the books is the humor and intelligent tone that speaks a kids language while never condescending or dumbed down.
There are text books all the way up through college math in this series, though we have not worked that far yet.
One of the best things about the books is the humor and intelligent tone that speaks a kids language while never condescending or dumbed down.
There are text books all the way up through college math in this series, though we have not worked that far yet.
September 17, 2010
I LOVE THIS BOOK! i'm so excited for the girls to use this when they get through multiplication and division. hurray for a math guy who can make math hilarious!
April 12, 2011
These are really funny/interesting math books that make you laugh while you learn. They go from Fractions
to Calculus and Trigonometry, so you can start wherever.
to Calculus and Trigonometry, so you can start wherever.
May 24, 2011
This book was such a great book!
February 3, 2014
I past the final bridge 14 out of 15!!!!
loved this silly story
loved this silly story
March 3, 2016
Better than Saxon Math
Displaying 1 - 14 of 14 reviews