Nature Math, Level 5

Strategy choice is the theme, and it is a genuine shift.

Until grade five, maths mostly has one method. From here there are several, and the skill is picking a good one. Twenty one pages that keep putting a child in front of a problem where two approaches would both work and one is obviously faster.

Decimals arrive here and they arrive physically. Tenths of a metre, tenths of a litre, tenths of a kilogram, all measured before any decimal point is written down. Decimals introduced as notation first are the reason so many adults are uneasy about them.

Estimation runs through everything. A child who can say roughly what the answer should be before calculating catches their own mistakes, which is worth more than speed.

There are project pages at this level too, longer and worth doing if the week allows.