Teaching Math to an Older Child

[linzy]

It's good to hear that.  My son is doing Right Start which wants children to be able to recognize by sight numbers up to five.  He can do one, two and five but three and four he struggles with.  We are really working on it, but he really would rather just count.

[bella]

linzy tina is the same age like your son . we also got rightstart math ,we are moving slowly , for a while she confused 3 and 4 but now it suddenly clicked up to five and we moved to 6 .it was a bit frustrating to me till she got it . she is not at all into writing , she loves playing with her dolls and animals , play store so i used any opportunity to count with her .
love
viv

[linzy]

Thanks Viv, It's good to know it's not just us.  Its frustrating because he just counts, because that's what i was encouraging him to do with simple math until we got the RightStart system. So, for now we are doing the up to 5 lessons a second time and working on the games.  I am going ahead and working on the other numbers up to 10, but if he doesn't get the instant recognition of numbers to 5 by then we will probably just camp out there and work with the games until he gets it.

[waterdreamer]

Now are you guys showing your children like a few items and asking them to tell you how many there are without counting? Please can you explain in detail.

[chispa]

Thank you to all for your replies!  It sounds like Andrew is right there with your kids.  I was a bit frustrated but attended a workshop Add Advantage on Math (I am  a teacher) and they really talked up the importance of really understanding 0-5.  So I can show Andrew 1-4 items (from books we read, pictures  anything that shows items, I ask questions about what he sees) and consistently can "name" how many he sees up to just 4.  I  got this fantastic idea from Gloria D.

As far as writing, Andrew has not been interested until I got Scribble and Write from Leapfrog and he is enjoying trying it out.

[DadDude]

Well, we have been using Singapore Math's Kindergarten Math Textbook A for three weeks, and I've looked ahead at both A and B, and I can give you a better report about it.  I really like it.  Many of the concepts in book A are easy for my boy, because of all the work we've done before.  But I can see how it quickly gets harder in book B, and I think having done book A will be a very good preparation for book B.

The books recommend and explain how to do supplementary activities with manipulatives, and if you follow their instructions--and even if you don't, and you simply work through the book--concepts are introduced with examples in a very intelligent, systematic way, which makes it very easy to do the next thing.  Each unit introduces a basic concept first by using the simplest sorts of examples, and steadily becomes more "abstract."  It's very gradual and painless, but in the end, it seems, the child will really know math well.

I find the way that they teach reading is very clever.  First, they teach same and different, and matching/basic sets, then counting and writing numbers.  (This part had us stuck; more on that in a second.)  Then putting sets in order according to size, and finally more than and less than.  The books (A and B) really seem to ease the child into addition and subtraction.

We were doing really well and I was happy with our progress until we got to Unit 3.  This introduced writing the numbers.  Well, my boy is reasonably good with a crayon and big pencil, but he can only write a few numbers and letters on request, and tracing relatively small (1 inch high) numbers was difficult and no fun.  So we took a break, and I made some giant numbers to trace, two per page.  Then I gave him a tiny sticker when he did each page.  This did the trick.  He did all of the numbers, 0-9, and was very happy to do them, too.

I just uploaded these under the titles "Number Tracing 4 per page, 0-9.pdf" and "Number Tracing 4 per page, 0-9.pdf".  But I just noticed that BrillKids has already made some similar worksheets...I looked all over for just such worksheets and ended up making them myself.  Why didn't I think to look here?  Oh well.

Anyway the plan now is to do the two-per-page number tracing a few more times, then do four-per-page...then maybe some smaller ones...and finally we’ll get back into the book.  We could go on in the book without being able to write our numbers, but if we can learn them now, we will.

To answer waterdreamer’s question, my view is that giving numbers of sets, or doing "instant calculation," basically counts as more or less random math preparation.  I don't mean anything disrespectful when I say "more or less random math preparation."  Until recently, our preparation was more or less random as well.  I'm just saying that at some point, you’ve got to stop doing more or less random math preparation type work so much and start in on actual math--which, for most people, means going through math textbooks.

Showing a child some items and saying what the number is, without counting, is just one skill among very many.  The fact that Doman kids are able to "subitize" (that's the word--I just learned it myself), if true, is very impressive, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if those kids were able to pick up math later very quickly.  But, again, subitizing is just one rather small part of math.  If your child is four, you might be able to start kindergarten math books like the one we got.  Of course, if you want to put off textbooks and worksheets as long as possible, I respect that.  I don't like them myself, I just make an exception for math a few other subjects.

By the way, my boy's favorite thing the last couple days has been to play "War" with six-sided dice (we have five apiece), 12-sided dice (six apiece), and cards.  He gets a huge kick out of this and of course it teaches him a very important math skill: same as, more, and less.  Using six-sided dice with the dots on them teaches him to subitize too...

[waterdreamer]

To answer waterdreamer’s question, my view is that giving numbers of sets, or doing "instant calculation," basically counts as more or less random math preparation.  I don't mean anything disrespectful when I say "more or less random math preparation."  Until recently, our preparation was more or less random as well.  I'm just saying that at some point, you’ve got to stop doing more or less random math preparation type work so much and start in on actual math--which, for most people, means going through math textbooks.

Oh I take no offence, I ask because I want to know. I'm very new to this and I want guidance.
I bookmarked the site that sells those textbooks you talked about. I'm going to try some of the basic "cheapie" dollarstore books first and see if this is something I can get my son to sit down and do. I don't want to spend money on something that will sit in the cupboard and collect dust. If this works then I will look into getting those textbooks.
You gave me tons of great ideas. Thank-you

[Gage]

Hello Everyone,

I will be helping a friend teach her 4year old son math. I had read earlier in this post that the dot cards will not help him and that we should start with a grid??? Could someone please explain this for me?

Thanks

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