Surprising progress in math

[DadDude]

With my little boy, now almost 4, I've been going through a Singapore Math kindergarten book.  We finished one and are onto the second.  Before that (and also continuing until now) we did all sorts of "manipulatives" work, like sorting buttons, playing War with both cards and dice, and various other things.  We also did do a few Doman-style math presentations, but we didn't look at them very much or very often.  I also made a 1-100 number presentation (not posted yet) some months ago and now he's counting spontaneously up to 50.  Also, we did go through a more traditional sort of workbook, maybe halfway through, and he was doing simple addition and a tiny bit of subtraction.  We also watched the LeapFrog "Math Circus" video quite a few times, I guess when he was around 2.5 or so (a year or more ago).

So, I decided to download an iPod app, called KidCalc, yesterday.  Wow, he really likes it.  So he started doing this math puzzle, which basically involves a grid of nine simple addition and subtraction problems covering up a picture.  If you get a problem right, then part of the picture is uncovered.  A problem would be, for example:

   3
 + 5
----

0 3 5 8

Each of the possible answers got its own button.

I was looking over his shoulder while he was playing this puzzle, and suddenly I was like, WTF?  (OK, I don't really talk that way. :-) )  He was doing the problems, getting them right on the first try, time and time again.  And he was doing them fast.  He was getting problems like 7+6 and 9+9 right, and also problems like 9-4 and 8-7.

I could hardly believe it.  I'm pretty sure we didn't study all those problems; I doubt he simply has them memorized (except for the simplest ones involving numbers up to 3, maybe).  I was especially surprised that he was doing subtraction, because we did that hardly at all.

Obviously, all that work paid off and the lessons sank in, but what is surprising to me is that he's gone beyond what we explicitly taught.

Just makes me wonder where he'd be if we had started with Doman math when he was really tiny!

[Kimba15]

Well good on you Henry. Your little boy keeps amazing us all.

I would really like to hear more about his progress. I have been using LM inconsistantly but plan to make a conserted effort this week to get on to it. My dd likes LM but does not love it. So I will be very interested to hear how he oes with the singapore math method.

Does your son write yet?

Kimba

[Sarah108]

Wow Daddude, you really sound like you've put so much effort into your son's Maths, well done! Could you tell me what you used to do when he was 1, if anything? I am using LM which I try to do now every day. I also do some physical flashcards, but just flashing numbers - I have not started any equations yet.

I hope to do that starting today!

[DadDude]

Well good on you Henry. Your little boy keeps amazing us all.

I would really like to hear more about his progress. I have been using LM inconsistantly but plan to make a conserted effort this week to get on to it. My dd likes LM but does not love it. So I will be very interested to hear how he oes with the singapore math method.

Does your son write yet?

Thanks Kimba--no, he doesn't write much yet.  He can write a few simple words but he just doesn't like practicing writing.

I cannot at all vouch that the Singapore method is responsible for his progress.  Right now he's down on it so we haven't done significant work in that book for several weeks.  That's OK--you always have to wait.  I'm thinking of trying Saxon math, which is the other one that's been recommended.  And then I'm also thinking about trying something more creative Doman-style but for an older child...

Wow Daddude, you really sound like you've put so much effort into your son's Maths, well done! Could you tell me what you used to do when he was 1, if anything? I am using LM which I try to do now every day. I also do some physical flashcards, but just flashing numbers - I have not started any equations yet.

I hope to do that starting today!

Well, all we did as far as I can recall was to go through quite a few books about numbers, which taught counting.  I'm sure I (and his mother) also counted out things for him with blocks and that sort of thing.  (I discovered today he can count to ten in his mother's language, which is not English. :-) )

I think counting to 100 and using a 100 number board has also helped a fair bit.  I forgot to mention the 100 number board.  We've had quite a bit of fun with that.

[Niniedney]

Hi, I am wanting to do more math with my daughter. Where can I learn more about these methods you are using?

[TheyCan]

I know you spend a lot of time with Legos.  Do you make a point to incorporate lessons when buiding things?  If not - he's probably still doing it in his head??

I think this shows once again that we don't give kids enough credit for what they know!  He probably has no pressure on him for learning math and it's just a part of life! 

[jtsbaby]

Wow...very impressive indeed! You must be so proud of your little genius.
How exactly did you get him to count to 100? Did you just show him numbers (1,2,3) and tell him what they were or did you just verbally count out items?
When and what did he start picking up first?
My son is 16 months and I just started flashing the doman dots. He is very good at reading the YBCR flash cards...but I am a little lost with math. Would love if you could share some tips and let us know what you were doing at 1.5 years and what you did to progress on. 

Where are you located? I am in the USA and I have heard the 100 number board used in Asia but not US I am trying to buy one here.

[linzy]

jtsbaby,

I can tell you how I taught my son to count to 100.  It took about a month.

First I went to worksheetworks.com and printed out a hundreds chart (http://www.worksheetworks.com/math/numbers/hundredchart.html) I chose base 10 and 100 percent filled in and then printed it out. 

Then I pointed to the numbers and had him count (initially he didn't really associate the numbers he said with all the written numbers). At first he could only count to 12 or so, so as he got to a number he didn't know I supplied it for him and he repeated all the way up to a hundred. You may find once you get out of the teens that your child can count much higher because the rest of the numbers are named so logically.

We did this every day one time (took about 2 minutes), and then later once he could do it almost by himself we added a second time where he counted by rote without looking at the hundreds chart.

 I told him when he could do it all by himself we would go to the dollar tree and he could pick out a prize.  A few weeks down the road he had it no problem.

[rakhirex]

Is it fine if I started with LM when my son turned 2.5? Do they lose quantity recognition by age of 2.6?

Regards
-Rakhi

[jtsbaby]

Linzy, thanks for ur suggestions. How old was ur child when u started?

[Sarah108]

Another way, which is Montessori-focussed is:

Get largish-flat beads, and thread them through a thick piece of string (red is always good to get their attention). Make ten of them. Hold the bulk of the beads in your hand, give the string some slack - and then drop the beads down, one at a time, counting 1-10.
Then put it down on the mat. Then bring out your next string, and do that again. All the way until 100.

In that way, the child PHYSICALLY can see 100.

If you want to teach them to count in tens, you count 1-10 so they can see you have ten beads in a string, then you put the rest of the sets down, whilst saying 10, 20, 30...and so on

 

[zaku]

jtsbaby,

I can tell you how I taught my son to count to 100.  It took about a month.

First I went to worksheetworks.com and printed out a hundreds chart (http://www.worksheetworks.com/math/numbers/hundredchart.html) I chose base 10 and 100 percent filled in and then printed it out. 

Then I pointed to the numbers and had him count (initially he didn't really associate the numbers he said with all the written numbers). At first he could only count to 12 or so, so as he got to a number he didn't know I supplied it for him and he repeated all the way up to a hundred. You may find once you get out of the teens that your child can count much higher because the rest of the numbers are named so logically.

We did this every day one time (took about 2 minutes), and then later once he could do it almost by himself we added a second time where he counted by rote without looking at the hundreds chart.

 I told him when he could do it all by himself we would go to the dollar tree and he could pick out a prize.  A few weeks down the road he had it no problem.

linzy thanks a lot for sharing

[DadDude]

I know you spend a lot of time with Legos.  Do you make a point to incorporate lessons when buiding things?  If not - he's probably still doing it in his head??

I think this shows once again that we don't give kids enough credit for what they know!  He probably has no pressure on him for learning math and it's just a part of life! 

I think there's definite truth in what you say.  I don't at all disagree with those people who say that you can learn a lot from playing, etc.  I just think that you can learn faster and more efficiently by supplementing that sort of play-learning with stuff like Doman presentations (and other educational approaches).

The only sort of math we do when doing legos is that I identify certain bricks as "two by four" or "two by eight" or whatever.  Sometimes with longer bricks we count out the dots.  But I totally agree, he's doing it in his head.  How can he not be getting substantial math practice from it?

Well, I don't insist that we do math, but in all honesty I do have to say that merely suggesting that we do something, so that he has to say "no" if he doesn't want to do it, is a sort of low-key pressure.  But it isn't much pressure, I think.

[DadDude]

So I will be very interested to hear how he oes with the singapore math method.

I cannot at all vouch that the Singapore method is responsible for his progress.

I just wanted to explain why I said that.  He hasn't gotten to the part in Book 2 where addition is introduced.  He has been exposed to addition from other places though.  I do think the Singapore books are excellent at introducing very basic concepts in an accessible, systematic way, so it's possible that it has helped a lot.  I just don't know!

[DadDude]

Wow...very impressive indeed! You must be so proud of your little genius.
How exactly did you get him to count to 100? Did you just show him numbers (1,2,3) and tell him what they were or did you just verbally count out items?
When and what did he start picking up first?

I don't know if he can count to 100.  I haven't asked him yet.  Basically we've done just two things: we've looked at counting-to-100 videos (there are some good ones on YouTube) and played with a 100 number board.  I think the videos are what did it though.  After watching some repeatedly, he just started repeating.

Basically, there are only two ways I've used to get him to memorize anything.  One is the method Doman uses, which is simply to expose the child to the info, and assume it will sink in, and it often does.  The other way is this...recently we memorized the first stanza of "Jabberwocky" and also "The world is so full of a number of things," and those he memorized simply by reading them over and over, and then I asked him to say them, and I would fill in the blanks if he paused (usually before the beginning of the next line.  We did that a few times and that's all it took.

My son is 16 months and I just started flashing the doman dots. He is very good at reading the YBCR flash cards...but I am a little lost with math. Would love if you could share some tips and let us know what you were doing at 1.5 years and what you did to progress on. 

I don't know what to tell you there, I don't really remember.  I'm sure we were still looking through the baby math books, counting-to-ten books, etc.  It was before I discovered baby reading or Doman or anything.  I forget when we started playing with buttons and other manipulatives (other than blocks and such)...might not have been until after he turned two.

Where are you located? I am in the USA and I have heard the 100 number board used in Asia but not US I am trying to buy one here.

I am also in the U.S.  I got a wildly overpriced one from Amazon....

BTW another thing we've done has been to read a good half-dozen "Math Start" books (Stuart J. Murphy).  The simplest ones (level one) should be accessible to many 1-2 year olds, I guess.

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