I’d like some new ideas. I want to be more focused and productive with math.
My daughter is 25 months, and right now we are doing (not all in day, but these are the things I have done with her, some are displayed on her work shelves for her to choose to do whenever. She favors reading right now.):
-Little Math (intermittently, only when she’s receptive)
-Counting on a ten bead abacus (it only goes to 50 though), I haven’t decided if I should get a slavonic abacus or focus soley on soroban for the future
-Counting on the soroban or I’ll ask her to show me a number (she can do 1-4), we’ve only just started
-Counting iPad apps
-I’ll put a number of small objects in a bowl and ask her how many (she can do 1-3, sometimes 4) without counting
-Matching cards (printed, laminated cards from more.starfall) they have various representations of the numbers (tally marks, dice, numerals, objects, etc.)
-Counting or color on a hundreds board chart (she can only count to about 14 reliably, than it might be “18, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 22, 20-11”, etc.
-Play with montessori colored counting rods (we use these as cuisenaire rods and they are the same dimensions, but in montessori bead colors since she will be attending a montessori school). We mostly just notice patterns or that you can pick a rod and find two other rods that add up to that one and talk about the language of math “half”, “add”, “subtract”, but I don’t feel like she’s learned a lot from this. I’m just getting her comfortable and engaged so that we can use Miquon Orange in the future (I have just started Miquon with my 5 year old and we sometimes do it all together, but my 2 year old probably isn’t getting a ton out of it).
-Kumon My Book of Numbers 1-30 (we are going slow, since this book is geared for 3 and up, and she doesn’t yet have the fine motor skill to finish the book, she does like it and any handwriting though)
-Kumon Write and Wipe Numbers 11-30 (because I loaned out and never got back 1-10), we match up beans or other little objects (vase filler, goldfish crackers, etc.) on the little dots as we count and then she’ll trace and erase and trace and erase, etc. the numeral (she loves to write).
-Brillkids number writing (laminated, and she useds a wet erase pen and little spray bottle of water and small wipe to rinse and repeat)
-LeapFrog Math Videos
-Montessori House Big and Fun Math
-Number Beats writing numerals (she just watches and I give her blank paper and a pen, I don’t really go over it more with her. She attempts to write, but really cannot do any on her own besides 1’s and 0’s, and I don’t really expect her to.)
-more.starfall play in the math area (includes numerals 1-20, 25, 50, 100; and games and songs for all 4 operations)
-random play with blocks or cars where we get a number and add or subtract or count (I probably don’t do this enough)
-random youtube videos, count to 100 mostly
-the intro video for touchmath kindergarten software (because she loves it, the demo doesn’t work anymore, so we haven’t done anymore, but she loves the “bear song”)
That feels like a lot now that I’ve typed it out and I may have forgotten some. But mostly, it feels unfocused. I’d like to get more focused somehow, wether that means sticking with one thing more consistently, getting a new thing, a real curriculum (rightstart perhaps?), or something else.
What are you doing with your 2 year olds (or what did you do at this age?)
? She looked at her 100’s board, and said, ’ look, Mommy, it’s a pattern! Odd, even, odd, even,etc! All the way to a hundred with me alternately hugging her and wiping away tears of pride and love…ridiculous, I know, but I am sure many of you know exactly those moments I am referring to!