About This Site
MathDoctor.net is a site designed to help parents who need help explaining sixth grade math. As I have worked with my own son with the Common Core math curriculum, I came to two realizations:
- The material itself isn’t that difficult
- The material is often explained in ways that make it difficult.
In order to make the material understandable, I realized that it fell to me to provide the necessary explanations, in order to show my son that the material is actually quite simple. It just needs to be explained properly. And since I need to go to the work of explaining it properly, I can make my explanations available to other parents and students.
Am I A Real Doctor?
Since the name of the site is MathDoctor.net, you might wonder whether I’m really a doctor. Well, yes, I am, kind of. I’m not a mathematician, and I’m certainly not a physician. I do have a doctorate degree, but it’s in law, since I’m an attorney. I’m also a continuing legal education provider, and offer classes which are taken by hundreds of attorneys to maintain their licenses. I occasionally work as a substitute teacher, although I don’t have an education degree. I don’t have a degree in math, but my college coursework included many upper division math courses, so I know all of the buzzwords your student’s teacher can throw at them. In fact, it’s quite certain that I know more buzzwords than the teacher. Therefore, the use of buzzwords in the curriculum doesn’t faze me, and I can explain those buzzwords in an understandable manner.
The content of the sixth grade common core math curriculum is something that any reasonably intelligent parent should be able to explain to their children. However, the curriculum itself often makes the material appear much more difficult than it actually is. The purpose of these videos is to cut through the confusion and explain the material in a straightforward manner.
You can use these videos in one of two ways. You can watch the relevant video yourself. After you do, I think you will realize that I’m explaining something you already knew: The only thing you didn’t know was the particular buzzwords that the educators assigned to familiar concepts. After you have learned the buzzwords, you will be in a position to help your own student with the material.
If you wish, you can have your student watch the videos. I don’t talk down to my viewers, and I treat them like adults. But there’s nothing in my videos that a reasonably intelligent sixth grader can’t understand. So if you decide to have your student watch my videos, I think you’ll find that they gain an understanding that the teacher’s lecture might not have provided.
Production Quality
As you can see from the videos, I’m not a professional video producer. I’m just a guy sitting in front of the computer, explaining with pencil and paper. And I suppose I ought to do something about all of the clutter in the background. In future videos, I’ll try to increase the production values just a bit. But in the meantime, I wanted to get the material available as fast as it’s thrown at my son.
Contact Information
If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to contact me at clem.law@usa.net. (Note: students should ask their parents to contact me, rather than contacting me directly. I don’t mind getting questions from students, but have your parents send them to me from their accounts, since that avoids all kinds of complications for me.)
My Other Websites
I also operate the following websites:
- OneTubeRadio.com is my blog, covering radio history, World War I, World War II, emergency preparedness, scouting, and many other seemingly unrelated topics.
- RichardClem.com is my law office and Continuing Legal Education website.
- w0is.com is my personal website, covering amateur radio and other topics.