Dust off the Rook Cards - Some Math Ideas for You!
Ally brought home a couple weeks ago some "homework." Actually she has brought other homework home. I am becoming the parent that I get so frustrated with - the ones who "forget" to send stuff back! I am trying to get better, but for some reason it is always the mom that has to go through the book bag.
I am a big fan of math - for some obvious reasons?!?! Don't get me wrong - we read and have her sound things out. But it is not always our focus - I am not a natural "reading" teacher. But math is a different story. Sometimes I can't believe what she is "learning" in kindergarten math since it seems so basic, but I guess there are other kids out there that don't get their addition facts as early as our kids. (We taught addition at supper with eating bites!)
They have been working on pattern units and counting units. The counting unit has been interesting. Some ideas out there to do with your kids that will help them gain number reasoning skills (and I approve this message!)
1. When you grab a random amount of something - napkins, cookies, fish crackers, legos, etc have the ESTIMATE (tell you how many the THINK are there). Then have the count them. Estimating is a skill that many kids are weak at in the middle levels but hey let's help them out when they are young.
2. When bored at the dr. office while WAITING - have them figure out how many eyes are in the room or fingers or toes or legs on the chairs. Some may start out by counting each one but that is OK!
3. Teach skip counting (evens and odds) then work your way up to doing 3s, 4s, 5s, 10s. (hopefully then later they can do the dr. office game by using those strategies.
4. As a beginer (like Drew or a 3yr old) draw numbers on one side of the page and pictures of objects on the other. Have them connect the picture to the number. Or make big number pages on paper - have them search the toy room and find that number of objects for that number.
5. Our newest idea - from our favorite kindergarten teacher, Mrs. Glanz - She gave us number cards to 10, but I pulled out the Rook cards since they went to 14. You can make your own cards but I would put them on cardstock. I would have a stack of at least 4 of each number. Divide the cards out between you and your kiddo. Each flip a card. Whoever has the bigger number says - ME and gets the cards. ALly is much faster than Drew but sometimes he makes a mistake - tonight it was 9 and 6 so we "built" those numbers out of fingers or legos or whatever and he had to redecide. We did it with 12 and 13 also.
You can do different variations of this game - like playing which is least. We have also added the two cards together and one person gets the evens and the other the odds. (throwing in our skip counting stuff!) Tonight Ally and I made a new variation of having 5 cards in our hand and playing the bigger number to get our partners cards.
You can do so much with younger kids to build number sense. These are all great ideas, but the most important part would be your kid EXPLAINING why they are making the decision to you. At first they won't be able to do it and you should model the reasoning or give them ideas of how to start, but you know they understand it if they can talk it through!
If you want more ideas - let me know. And if you are a stalker that has some great reading skill games - let me know:)
6 comments:
Thanks for the math ideas Brenda! Really, really good ideas. I'm always looking for ways to help re-enforce math skills in daily life. I've just been thinking about the estimating thing recently, and how that's pretty much all I do. My 3rd grader is having some difficulty with that, so I want to help the little kids when they are younger work on estimating before it becomes a school subject. Thanks again!
(this is Sarah by the way)
Brenda, good ideas!
I always play 'what makes 5' with my little ones.
Then after that is mastered we move to what makes ten or 'what makes 2 fives'. It helps them learn that 7 is really 5 + 2 and they are so familiar with 2 and 3 making five, (5 +2) +3...it makes early facts up to 10 easily separated into small comprehension groups.
I introduce math as a language by telling stories with numbers. Then I tell them the symbols of Math can tell the same story but can't use words. It's fun for little ones to try and communicate without using words just written symbols or only speaking the names of symbols. Girls often like the secret code to tell stories and boys a faster way to communicate using less words.
The 'Cheerio challenge' is another favorite. You get 24 Cheerios and see how many *true* sentences you can write down by moving around the 24 items. Autumn came up with 82 in 10-15 minutes when she was 5 (using all 4 operations). Then they can eat the number of successful stories when they are done. (works better with candy if you choose)
As for reading I try not to let my children learn the name of letters until after they know the sounds the letters make. It removes a step for reading and writing; having to process the the name and then move to the sound. Obviously it's not possible to keep all the names from them but I over emphasize the sound. When I get asked what letter this is I say the sound not the name.
Nice to see there are other math nerds besides me out there! :)
Laura Lynn
Great tips, thanks Mrs Math teacher.
Hey Brenda-
Always hit your blog after Jared and Allison's! We have some fun phonics games that we play that came with our home school curriculum. We use Sonlight Language Arts... and we love their "Go A to Z" (Go fish with letter sounds) and their "Letter and Word Bingo." They also have a go fish game played with blends like "er" "ing" etc. I'll put a link to them... they are SO CHEAP.
We always call the letter by the sound it makes, and then have to think up a word that has that sound. So, we don't say "gee" but "guh." And then we say something like goat or gorilla to represent that sound.
It's fun... at least we think so!
Anna Hughes
Oh, and it would be so easy to make your own cards with 3 x 5 index cards... but hey, I figure most moms have enough on their plates!
http://www.sonlight.com/1L09.html
http://www.sonlight.com/KL11.html
http://www.sonlight.com/1L10.html
Great ideas.
I also do counting bites at supper time. Another take on that is subtraction.... "if you have 5 peas left and you eat 1, how many are left?"
-Britt
Great math post...makes me think i should do a reading one.
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