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…
