dispatch from math-land

I want to do math.  I want to do math.  That is pretty much ALL I hear these days from my five year old.  Not that reading has lost it's luster, but math is very much the in thing.  As with how she took to language and reading, math seems to be acquired in the same fashion for her.

I still really don't buy into the value of the "gifted" label, for the stuff she does is something all her peers will do eventually.  Just because she gets it faster and sooner should not be all that remarkable.  It's the same material she would get to eventually.   She doesn't think she's anything special because she likes to do math. 

On our last trip to the library, we took a spin through the non-fiction section and the huge math section.  I happened to grab this Multiplication and Division book and I love it.  It is written

textbook style, but very, very succinctly.  Two pages per concept and wonderfully pragmatic.   It even introduced something I had never heard of in all my years of school---- the Russian peasant method and lattice method of multiplication.   One page each and it made total sense.   I predict the two of us doing page after page of this style of multiplication just for fun.  The authors also have a handful of other books on other math topics and I predict we will make our way through them in the next year or two.

I am blessed by this kid for she is so easy to teach, so eager to learn.  Part of my concern with constantly finding her school experience "too easy" is that she won't learn the value of working through frustration.  Math saved the day on that one.  A month or so ago she was interested in doing some workbook pages at a higher level, but struggled with the concepts for six or seven examples til it clicked.  Tears.  Tears. Tears.  As someone who cried often in school, I knew precisely what this was about.  Yet somehow math with it's demand for precision, it's one right answer nature helped her see that after a certain amount of repetition it would click.

Her first school conference is coming up soon and although the school sent home a list of suggested questions and topics, I really have only one.  What are your instructional goals for her?   Honestly, I could probably plunk her in a third grade classroom and she'd be happily in the middle of the pack.   That's obviously not the solution, but the realm of public schools and education policy is not exactly familiar to me.  Do I really have to ask for the Gifted IEP that Pennsylvania provides for?   Or do I continue to "double school" her until the school catches up to? 

I've almost given up asking questions and wondering about possible solutions.  I know what works.  It kind of feels like feeding a hungry monster at times, but it works.  The library is on my irksome list these days for the reading club thing, but it is a pretty spectacular resource nonetheless.  We also picked up a copy of the Usborne See inside Math flap book and it is delightful.  It also seems to be a brand new copy, so there's a bit of that new jar of peanut butter thing happening with a rush to open the flaps simple because they haven't been opened yet.   Rebecca at Toothwhale has begun a fun page of children's books they're reading and I ought to do the same.  Park days are dwindling and it's going to be a long winter with a bored kindergartener if I don't plan ahead!

Comments

[Mel]

It's great that you "double-school" her. Obviously, I have not much idea about the US school system, but I know that here in the UK there are little provision (other than private schooling) for children who are ahead of their peers.

Are there any groups locally with people in a similar situation to you? You could maybe form your own reading club or teaching club?

[Jessica]

Private school! You would be, after all, paying them to go out of their way for your child. I wouldn't hesitate. Public school is made for the masses. It isn't a bad thing if your child is right in the middle of the mass. But if she isn't....I would look elsewhere.

[Julie]

It's been so interesting to catch up with what you guys are doing on here!! =)