maths equations

[DomanMom]

Part IV

Starting with a Baby (Twelve Months to Eighteen Months)

   If you are beginning your math program with a child of this age the two most important things to remember are:

1.   Very, very brief sessions.
2.   Stop before he wants to stop.

   In terms of the Math Pathway you will be emphasizing the first and second and third steps (Chapter Seven). As you work your way up the Math Pathway with a child at this particular stage of development, the most important refinement is to keep the duration of every session very, very brief.
   The reason this is so important is that now his mobility development becomes extremely important.
   At twelve months, a baby is either walking or beginning the process of moving between people or furniture while holding on with his hands in order to work his way by degrees to his first independent steps. By the time that same child is eighteen months old he will not only have become a good steady walker but he will have begun to run. This is quite an accomplishment in six short months. In order to achieve these spectacular results he must put a great deal of time and energy into feats of physical daring.
   At no other point in his life will physical movement assume the importance that it does at this moment. You can be assured that if you were to attempt to follow your baby and simply do each of the things he does physically during the day you would be absolutely exhausted after a single hour of his routine. It has been tried.
   No adult is physically up to the rigors of what the average twelve- to eighteen-month-old can handle in a given day.
   These physical activities are of great importance to the tiny child. During this period of his growth and development we have to be especially wise about adapting his math program to his intense physical program. Up to this moment in his life a group of five dot cards or three equations at one session may be perfect. However, during this stage this may need to drop to three dot cards at a session or two or even one.

   There is no single principle of teaching that will take you further than that of always stopping before your child wants to stop.

   Always stop before he wants to stop.

   Always stop before he wants to stop.

   Always stop before he wants to stop.

   This principle is true for all teaching of all human beings at all stages of development and at any age.
   But it is most especially true for the twelve- to eighteen-month-old.
   He needs a high frequency, low duration schedule. Lots of brief sessions suit him. Indeed he needs those brief, treasured respites from his labors.
   He will love the entire Math Pathway from the first step of recognizing quantities of dots to the fifth step of sophisticated equations with numerals, but he will need extremely short sessions because he is a man on the move and cannot afford to tarry for very long.
   Very short and sweet sessions are best for him.

[KL]

A heap of karma to you!

[dawnn]

Elizabeth, thanks for all this valuable information. My son does not like the dots flash cards but he is very interested in maths equations. I didnt know that he can he learn the equations at 2. thanks a lot.

[Maddy]

Hi Elizabeth

Sorry for my late reply.

Thank you so, so much for all of this (you certainly have good karma! Most deserved ). You took so much time to explain everything to everyone, and I think it will make a lot of people (myself included) much more likely to follow through with the math program. The fact that your site is offering PowerPoint dot cards and lessons schedules is completely awesome.

I'm one of those parents who started and stopped the math program, because my baby didn't like it. We did reach the equations (addition and subtraction) but I still was getting a completely bored reaction; sometimes even tears. I think it will be easier to teach my DD on the computer rather than with the physical cards, because she already loves her computer-based lessons (namely Little Reader).

Thanks again Elizabeth. I'm sure your feedback on Little Math will also be invaluable when it comes up for beta-testing...

Maddy

[laidalays]

Hi, how do you show the dot cards to your baby? I started showing my baby   the first ten dot cards (from 1-10) some weeks ago but I felt he wasn't much interested when I showed him dot and told him number so I decided to change the way I was doing it and I took only five dot cards (from 1-5) and  started showing him dots and counting them.This way please him so much and he enjoys a lot counting dots with me. Now I'm going to start the 5 - 10 dot cards, and I'm not quite sure whether I'm doing it right because now I only have a few dots to count but what about counting 20 or 30 dots, not to say when counting 100!  I suppose I'm not doing it right but what can I do? Please help me

[DomanMom]

There's no real cookie-cutter way to get a baby interested in numbers. All babies are different so you will have to read your baby's cues to see what he likes, and find a way to make it fun and interesting.

The first thing is to go very, very quickly. Each card should be shown for less than a second, no longer than it takes to say the name of the number.

The second thing is how many cards you show at once. Seeing ten numbers at once is usually far too much for most babies. Seeing five numbers at once may be too much for some. If he is not interested in seeing five then show him three or two or even one at a time.

Find a ways to make it fun, interesting, and fast. I had a lion puppet that would gobble up the numbers and talk to Hunter about how much fun math was. Be silly. It will take you very far. Try getting your child while he is in his high chair and do something silly with the numbers while you show him, like hide behind one and play peek-a-boo. Like say, "Here comes TWENTY FOUR!!!!!" with as much enthusiasm as you can muster and then bring it up from under the table and let him see it for a half second, then hide it. "Oh, where did twenty four go?" "Ah! Here is is!!!" and bring it out again and shake it close to his face and tickle him. "Look, what else does Mommy have here? Oh, do you want to see it? Oh, here it comes, here it comes, it's... TWENTY TWO!!!!" Tickle him, laugh with him, and remember he only has to glance at it to absorb the information - tiny kids do not need to stare.

Yes it is probably not a good idea to count them because, like you said, once you get to forty and sixty and one hundred it will not be so easy. Also the goal is for him to learn the names of quantities, of true numbers, not to count them. If he wants to count them, showing them quickly will discourage that and he will quickly learn that this is a different game than the counting one.

I see that your baby is one year and eight months so that would put him in the older toddler category. Have you read the excerpts I have included about teaching the various ages? 18-30 months is here: http://forum.brillkids.com/general-discussion-b5/maths-equations/msg6351/#msg6351

I hope that you find a way to make teaching math to your baby fun and interesting. He will thank you for it for the rest of his life.
 

[laidalays]

Thank you so much for your advice, you always have the right answer for everyone, and are always so kind helping whoever needs it with maths , I will try to follow your instructionds, they are quite interesting and I hope successful. Karma to you !! for all your patience

[ZaJa]

Elizabeth, do you check whether Hunter is able to know the answers after every 2 weeks of learning a particular set of equations? Or do you just randomly check after finishing all 2-weeks sets of Addition, Subtraction, Multiplication and Division? I know we are not supposed to "test" babies according to Doman. I'm sure you do it with Hunter in a very fun way?

[DomanMom]

Zaja: I actually did do problem-solving games with Hunter after two weeks of learning something new. When I first taught him addition, I showed him three equations per day for two weeks and at the end of those two weeks, found a time when he was in a great mood and asked him if he wanted to play a game. I would just lay two or three cards down, and ask "Which one is ten plus seventeen?" I was actually amazed when he got them all right and wanted to just tell the whole world. But, most people don't take kindly to it, so I just kept it to myself.

After a week of subtraction, he appeared bored so I played this game again and he got them all right, so I moved onto multiplication to keep him interested. After five days of multiplication, same thing, and then after three days of division, still the same. If your baby is interested in playing this game with you, than go for it, but keep it short.

Never test - testing would be putting him in the spot to find out what he doesn't know - "Can tell your Daddy the answer to this equation?" It is ultimately disrespectful to the child because he gets the idea that you don't believe he can do it. This is the best way to kill the desire to learn math, so avoid it like a plague.

Problem-solving, on the other hand, is really the opposite of testing, because you are letting him demonstrate what he does know if he wishes to do so, not trying to expose what he doesn't. If you give him two answers to choose from and keep it short, he will love the game as long as you remain joyful and silly. If he picks the wrong answer, don't scold him "No, that's NOT the right answer!" He will hate the game if you do this. Simply hold the correct answer closer to his face and say, "THIS is ten plus ten, isn't it?"

Also, keep it short - stop before he wants to stop. This was one thing I DIDN'T do in the beginning and it proved a thorn in our side - Hunter began to consistently choose the OPPOSITE answer of the correct one to show me he was bored. If this happens - take a hint and don't push it again. Also, when he began to do that I would say to him, "You get to keep all the wrong answers and I'll keep all the right answers!" I said this in a silly way, not mean or condemning. He quickly decided that he wanted the right answers and Mommy got to keep all the wrong answers!

Your baby may not want to demonstrate his knowledge, and that is perfectly fine. You can give him an opportunity to problem-solve, but if he chooses not to answer, simply hold the correct answer closer to him and say, "This is five times three, isn't it?" give him a tickle and a hug and tell him how smart he is, and then PUT THE CARDS AWAY.Try again at another time to see if he is interested in playing. I knew one family on DomanInspiredParenting.blogspot.com who would play the game with each other (Mommy and Daddy) and then when their baby saw them playing, he would creep over to see what they were doing and they would say, "Oh, would you like to have a turn Timothy? Okay, Timothy, which one is 93 divided by 3?" That way it was like a game that they were letting him in on. There are other ways to get your child interested in playing, and as long as you keep it very, very brief and only try every once in a while, there is a good chance that he will want to play with you.

And remember, learning is input, not output. Demonstrating his knowledge is not a necessity to having it. Be gentle with him, take his hints, and don't push it or you could crush the desire to learn. You only get one chance to introduce your child to math - make it a good one.

Hope this helps, God bless!

[tatianna]

karma to you domanmom
thanks so much for all your help on math dots
we did dots one though hundred before she was 9 months old
but stopped after addition because she lost interest in it
i never tested her
and am still not sure if she got it
we are going to start again with subtraction this week (she is now two)
for a long time we weren't sure if we should just start again at the beginning
doman says never to go back  but he doesn't say anything about a year break from the program
math is really important to us so we will start again at subtraction where we left off
any advice?

[DomanMom]

I started my nephew Anthony on the math program when he was ten months old, and worked with him somewhat irregularly up to about 60 dots, just showing him numbers but never got into arithmetic. Then we stopped because I stopped babysitting him in the morning. He is almost two now, his birthday is in November.

However, two days ago I was babysitting both him and his three-month-old brother, and his brother seemed bored so I decided to start teaching him numbers, as three-months old is old enough to do the regular dots (rather than the jumbo, black and white infant stimulation dots). I showed Jordan (the three-month-old) numbers one - twenty, then asked Anthony if he would like to see the dots and I gave him some problem-solving opportunities, and he remembered them all! To say the least I as very pleased, as it has been at least six months since he has seen any dots.

I would go ahead and try jumping right into equations because seeing the dots will rekindle her memory. If you show her "twenty three minus seventeen equals six" she will be reviewing the numbers twenty three, seventeen, and six without knowing that she is reviewing them. I think that just going ahead and doing the equations will probably be review enough. If you don't think it's necessarily "sticking" you might try doing a little bit of review, like showing her all of the numbers a few times through (in small sets of course, like showing her 0-10 one day, 11-19 the next, 20-29 the next, etc. showing each set a couple times that day in a fun and playful manner) but you probably shouldn't go back to square one and start like it is her first time seeing dots.

For Anthony my almost two-year-old nephew, I'm just going to start addition with him and also finish teaching him numbers 60-100. I will probably do a small amount of review, like the review I mentioned above, but most of our reviewing will be seeing old numbers used in equations.

[ZaJa]

Thanks so much Elizabeth for sharing! It's great to hear from someone who has had success in Math. Hunter is a livng testimony that babies can learn Math with Mommy's love and gentle teaching Karma to you!!!

[tatianna]

i tried to do some review a couple of months ago
but she hated it wouldn't look and just run off
so i am going to try just the math problems
good to know about your nephew
i don't know anyone that stopped the dots and then went back to it
seems like once they stop they stop for good

it's hard with her because although she has a vocabulary of 2000 words
she never says the number or any word that i show her
so i can't be sure what she knows in reading and math
on the other hand she loves the Encyclopedic Knowledge program and will say the names of painting etc
so i am just taking it by faith that she is learning and keep showing her new material

[DomanMom]

Yeah, my son is 3 1/2 and has a vocabulary of who knows how many thousands of words, but will never just say the numbers for me, like if I hold up a card and ask how many he just says some random number. However he can pick the right number out of a pile and does good math, so I know that he knows even though he won't say them to me.

Good luck with your daughter, I hope you both have fun with the equations!

[nohayo]

I have a question too Elizabeth Once you've completed the math program with Hunter, do you revisit it from time to time and revise? or just leave it as it is?

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