What I took away from that meeting, besides sore eyes from squinting at the little tiny numbers in narrow columns, was that there are a few things we can begin doing with our youngest learners that will contribute toward their proficiency in mathematics.
So here are your end of February provocations dealing with math-ness.
Both third and fifth graders have trouble
(according to standardized test scores) with numeric sense.
For example, how much is 4? Not just counting to 4
but the 1 to 1 correspondence that constitutes 4.
(remember, I'm an English major who got a 6 on her ACT in
math and had to beg her statistics prof to pass her
so I hope this makes sense to you!)
Can your children count to 10 if the prompt is
to begin counting at 3 rather than 1? At 7?
Third graders have some trouble understanding
(of all things) charts and graphs.
They can identify a chart or a graph but they
don't understand WHY you would use a chart or graph.
In other words, they don't get graph-ness or chart-ness.
When you make a chart or a graph, do you
ask the children what the chart or graph tells you?
What it doesn't tell you?
Do they have opportunities to decide THEY want to
chart or graph some information or does it
always come from you?
I really can't wait to hear your responses to this!
(according to standardized test scores) with numeric sense.
For example, how much is 4? Not just counting to 4
but the 1 to 1 correspondence that constitutes 4.
(remember, I'm an English major who got a 6 on her ACT in
math and had to beg her statistics prof to pass her
so I hope this makes sense to you!)
Can your children count to 10 if the prompt is
to begin counting at 3 rather than 1? At 7?
Third graders have some trouble understanding
(of all things) charts and graphs.
They can identify a chart or a graph but they
don't understand WHY you would use a chart or graph.
In other words, they don't get graph-ness or chart-ness.
When you make a chart or a graph, do you
ask the children what the chart or graph tells you?
What it doesn't tell you?
Do they have opportunities to decide THEY want to
chart or graph some information or does it
always come from you?
I really can't wait to hear your responses to this!
4 comments:
This is a great question regarding math in the classroom. Perhaps try to put numbers in a hat/container and when the child chooses a number they have to search in the room and find 4 things, or 8 things so the correlation is built in a game, or in the hat/container have little bags containing small items (5 popsicle sticks, 10 marbles) and have the child count the items and write on the outside of the bag/container the number of items enclosed. Then as a class you can line up the bags 1-...and determine most items, least items...Could be fun w/o much work to put together a little game. Peggy
We love "Math-ness" in preschool! We do a lot with "greater than" and "less than" when we vote on different things. We have done charts and graphs, and even a Vehn diagram or two, but the kids have never asked to do them. It seems like we are introducing so many new topics that we don't have time to go back and talk about old concepts.
It is helpful to hear what the older kids are having trouble with so we can focus more on that topic in preschool.
We definitely do a lot of math concepts in preschool, but we've found that it's important to make the level of difficulty appropriate for each child. A few months ago, we had each child make their own number book(1-10)with stickers where they put that many stickers on the corresponding number. This seems to help 3-4yearolds with 1-1correspondence. Many of our 5 year olds, already know this, so we gave them a harder number book. Their book had simple addition problems on each page where they put the total number of stickers for their answer.It kept the older kids challenged, but it was still fun!
This is from Cheryl Gallagher-Watson in Creative Play.
As for math in our Creative Play classes we try to use
all areas. Most recently for Valentines Day we went on
a Heart hunt children would look for red, pink, and purple hearts.Then once the children found them we sorted the hearts accordingly to the color. Pink on the pink paper and so on. After that we then counted how many of each color heart we found as a class. The activity was a hit and it really gave me a sense of where the children are with their skills. Sorting,counting and graphing.
In our afternoon class we frequently try to do graphing activities with the children. Recently we graphed who like hot cocoa with marshmallows and
without marshmallows. I also always try to count out loud whenever be it counting the children, counting to see how long it takes friends to do something or myself to do something.
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