The teens and the tens

It is time!

 

It is time to take out my Montessori sets before it turn into dust and before Doll has no use for it! :D

 

I decided to teach Doll all about teens and the tens.

 

Actually I sort of already taught her before but this is just to reinforce her learning.

 

Note, I may not necessarily follow the authentic Montessori way in presenting but it works anyway.

 

 

 

First, we take out our tens beads. Doll determines that there are ten yellow beads strung together in a set.

 

 

Then we lay out the ten beads beside our teen board accordingly.

 

 

Next, we determine the number of beads in each colour set. For instance, the red set has just one bead, the green set, 2 beads, the pink, 3 beads and so on.

 

 

 

With our attention back to our teen board, we slide the '1' on the '10'. Here's where I tell Doll that 10 and 1 makes 11. I show her the 'magic' as I place the '1' on top of the '10'.

 

I also place a red bead, representing one, below the ten yellow beads. I counted them and determined that there 11 beads altogether. And again I told her that 10 (point to the yellow beads) and 1 (point to the red bead) makes 11. I do the same for 12 and the rest of the teens.

 

 

And we continue with the rest (here I only show up to 15).

 

At the end of the session, I randomly queried her how many does 10 and 3 makes or 10 and 5 makes etc, just to check if she understood what was presented. Sometimes, during our day to day I will also throw these questions at her just to reinforce what she learnt.

 

 

Also, I taught her what it means by counting by tens. I used my trustee ten boards. I showed that one ten makes ten, two ten makes twenty (and I counted each bead to show her that) and so on.

 

As with the teens lesson, I would ask her how many does 5 tens make or 7 tens make etc.

 

 

Next, as with the teen boards, I showed her that 40 and 3 makes 43. First we lay out 4 tens yellow beads and a 3 beads set.

 

 

I slide the 3 over the 40 and showed her that 40 and 3 makes 43. We counted the beads and determine that indeed 4 tens and 3 bead makes 43 and so on.

 

These activities are great for the child to learn place value. With these visual aids, it would be easier for the child to understand the place values later on.

 

And here's how I taught my pre-schooler all about the tens and the teens. :)

 

If you would like to know more here's a link on the know-hows and even how to DIY.

 

http://livingmontessorinow.com/2013/09/02/montessori-monday-diy-montessori-teen-and-ten-boards/

 

 

Summing it up

BabyDoll can somewhat do simple mental sums. She is especially good with numbers within 10. She is able to figure out that 5+2 is 7, or 5+3 etc. But oddly, she cannot do 18+2 or 50+2 LOL. I think the bigger numbers intimidates her.

 

To be able to do simple addition and subtraction, the child must be very strong in her number order. She must know what comes before and after a number. With that she should be able to do simple sums like 5+1 or even 14+1.

 

Obviously, Doll isn't strong in her number order when it comes to numbers beyond 20. I felt she just needed a macro view of the number order.

 

I could use my Daiso blocks but I was too lazy to arrange 100 blocks of wood. I recalled I made this colourful 100 board for Sonshine and decided to use this instead.

 

 

 

I rummaged through my shelf and was overjoyed when I found it!

 

I simply used colored paper to make each row and divided each row.  I then used circular sticky labels and stuck on the paper. I wrote down the numbers on the labels and viola it is done!

 

 

 

 

Here's how I helped Doll 'see' and make sense of simple addition above 30. I wrote down the sums.

 

Let's take a look at 63+2

 

 

I gave her a counter, a male fairy counter that is. And told her that 63+2 means, she already has 63 sweets and I gave her 2 more. I had her place her counter on the number 63, the number she had to start with. And told her since she needed to add 2 to 63, she needs to move her fairy up 2 spaces. You will notice this is a bit like playing a board game.

 

It helped her very well. She continued to the rest of the sums I wrote for her.

 

 

by She also dabbled on more sums on her Kindy book. She did herself by using the number chart above.

 

 

Counting to 100

Apart from reading, Doll has also been dabbling in a little bit of counting.

 

I am sort of a lazy parent. I always like to take short cuts. The thought of teaching her the numbers from 1-100 number by number tires me. So I thought of a way to get this done quickly.

 

She knows her numbers from 1-30 and I sensed that she saw the pattern ie. after every tenths you start with a 1,2,3 etc. To give example, after 20 is 21, 40 is 41 and so on. What she did not know is what comes after the ninth etc. 39, 49, 59,79.

 

 

 

 

Instead of making her count from 1 to 100, I used my favourite DIY number blocks. I laid out the blocks in sequence, but I left out the tens column. Laying out the blocks gives her the visuals to the number order.

 

I showed her where to place the tens. I also showed her the pattern. I showed her that after the 40s it is the 50s and then 60s etc. It was easy for her to grasp because she knows her order from 1-10 (I hope I am making sense here).

 

 

 

I also made my usual printables as a follow up to help her drill deeper into her . >O<

 

 

I also got her this book in haste. I am fortunate that she enjoys doing such 'work'. She automatically asks for it when the brother is doing his. Ah, the beauty of peer pressure.

 

 

But I soon realised she cannot quite do the whole book. I had wrongly thought that kindergarten 2 level is about counting and simple additions. But I was wrong. There are questions similar to number bonds. So it looks like we have to sit out on this one for awhile. 

DIY hundred board

Ah yes, I already own one Montessori board but my itchy fingers just needed to make another one for Doll. I simply LOVE DIY stuff! I couldn't resist doing it after seeing these woods in Daiso. JUST-GOT-TO-MAKE-'EM!

 

If you desire to own a hundred board but don't want to splurge on one. Here's a cheap way to make your own. And easy too!

 

 

 

You can get these babies from Daiso. It comes with 18 (if my memory didn't fail me) of these in one pack for just $2! You need to get about 5 packs and that just cost you $10 in total!

 

 

You can either write directly on the wood or get those sticky labels. I did the latter. LOVE the effect. And oh, what happens when the child is done with these? You can convert them into free play, wood blocks! How's that? Play and learning incorporated in one, and it's affordable! Now do you know why I love DIY stuff?

Come and Frog with me *croak*

I am very grateful to Doll's kindergarten teachers. They are doing a fantastic job teaching her how to read, write and study thematic topics. She's having a lot of fun learning at school too. That explains why I have been pretty laid back with the home teaching.

 

But recently I was suddenly inspired to make some frog theme activities for her.

 Bouts of inspirations like these does wonders!

 

 

Doll's teacher will go through the day of the week with her class everyday. To the point where, she can read almost all the days in words. I made this matching 'Days of the week' cards to help her reinforce her reading.

 

 

To make it interesting, I threw in the 'lily pads' into our sensory box. Doll makes the frog jump according to the day of the week from Monday to Tuesday to Wednesday etc.

 

 

I bought this Safari Toob a long time back. So I took it out and have Doll find the matching poison dart frogs to the card.

 

 

I printed these free Frog Nomenclature cards from here. First I have her match the picture cards.

 

Later, she matches the word cards to the pictures. She can't recognise the words on the cards so she's expected to compare the spelling of each card and determine if they are the same. I would also read aloud each word card as she picks.

 

Learning parts of a frog. 

 

I managed to borrow two very interesting reads on frogs from the library.

 

As we flip through the pages, we try to spot some familiar looking frogs :).

 

 

Doll was taught writing alphabets and numbers in school. She's learning them very well and can write most letters and numbers independently. Still, I created these cards for her to practise her writing and hopefully, remember the spelling of the words :D.

 

 

Learning a simplified frog cycle. Matching the correct figurine to the right cards.

 

 

Since our last math learning, she now understands that 10+3= 13. I whipped this up just for her to practise and reinforce what she learnt. This time no visual aids, all done mentally and from recalling what she learnt the last time. 

 

 

If you need more ideas, there are lots more ideas on this theme over at Living Montessori Now here. Lots of free printable too!

 

Have a croaking good time!

 

 

 

Bitten by the math bug!

 

We have been hit by the math bug! Here are a series of math activities I have been working on with Doll.

 

 

The hundred board was getting dusty! I took it as a call to bring it out and have Doll work her numbers from 1-40 (just to refresh her memory).

 

Just like when Sonshine was a toddler, I accidentally found out Doll could do simple addition and subtraction. One day, she told me that after she drank one bottle of Yakult, there would be xx remain. Curious, I asked her if she had say, 8 bottles of Yakult and mummy drinks 1, how many would there be left? She yelped out '7'! I threw her more questions like these that require her to either add or substract by ones and twos. I soon realised she is getting the concept.

 

Wanting to seize this sensitive period of hers, I hastily drew up the above activity. She had to draw two cards and add them up with the help of animal counters.

 

 

Also, I thought it was high time that she tried her hands on the teen board. It is not my intention to teach her place value at this point, but I wanted her to see the pattern. What better way than to use Montessori materials!

 

I showed her that each of the yellow string of beads has ten beads. And if we add say one bead, the total becomes 11 and on and on. By the time I hit 13, she wanted to do it herself and I let her.

 

Much to my surprise, she grasp the concept almost instantly. Later even without the teen board, she could tell me that 10 + 6 = 16 or 10 + 9 = 19. She even figured out that 10 + 10 = 20!

 

I love montessori!

 

Over lunch, I would try to do a quick activity or two. Some time this week, I took out the number counters and we fiddled with it. I showed her that the number '2' has a partner (see the round counters) whereas '3' has no partners. She got curious and took out the other times in search of which numbers have partners or which do not have. We sorted out which numbers have partner and which do not.

 

If you have not figured out by now, I am taking a step forward to teach her about odd and even numbers. I still think she is not ready so I introduced to her the terms 'partners' first. Hopefully, it will help her understand the terms odd and even better later.

 

I got these huge dice and played with her over lunch. Sometimes we would count and add the numbers. The other day, we each took a dice and we rolled to see who gets the bigger number. I introduced the terms 'more' and 'less' while playing. I simply asked 'who has more?' or 'who has less?'.

 

Ah, I feel so at ease with math. I just love math home learning with my kids!

 

Long Division with regrouping

I have taught Sonshine division using Montessori. From then, he is able to do mental division without regrouping i.e 266 divide 2 or 369 divide by 3.

 

Recently, I decided to teach Sonshine how to do long division that require regrouping and how to do the step by step working.

 

I tried teaching him by making him memorise the steps (which is a mix of division, multiplication and subtraction) but it didn't sit well with him. Realising that he needed to understand the technicalities behind the steps, I started to search for inspiration on how I can teach him. And lo and behold, I found it in our very own Primary 3 textbook. I was pleasantly surprised that our Math curriculum is adopting the Montessori method in explaining the subject to our kids. Finally someone up there see the good in Montessori Math! They have very wisely and cleverly combined the Montessori Math with the long division method. I was impressed!

 

Anyway, I studied it and presented to Sonshine exactly the way the textbook depicted. It worked!

 

 

 

 Here's how:

 

Let's work on this question 265 divide by 5.

 

 

 

 

You need Montessori 100, 10 and 1 stamps as well as green skittles. If you don't own these, you can easily make them using colored papers and simply writing the values on the paper. As for the skittles, you can use any objects really.

 

First, take out 2 hundreds, 6 tens and 5 ones to make 265.

 

265 is to be divided by 5, so take out 5 skittles. To make it more interesting. you can tell the child that there are 265 stamps to be distributed among 5 people. Pretend the skittles are people.

 

 

 

 

Next show the working as above.

 

Tell the child, always start with the largest value first. In this case, hundreds is the largest value. Next, he should try to distribute 2 hundreds to the 5 skittles. Notice, there is not enough hundreds to give out. The child has to convert all the hundreds into tens. 2 hundreds equals 20 tens.

 

Show the working:

 

 

Explain that the top part is the number of stamps distributed to each skittle. In this case, zero hundreds skittle was used. So put a '0' on top. And zero hundreds were distributed, hence '0' below the 2 under the hundreds column.  

 

 

After which, point out to the child after the conversion, he now has 26 tens (20+6) tens altogether. Show this in the working:

 

 

 

 

He can now distribute all the tens stamps.

 

 

Notice after distributing 25 tens stamps (5 tens stamps to each skittle) he has 1 ten stamps left over.

 

  

 

 

Divert the child's attention to the working. Tell the child that each skittle now has 5 tens stamps, hence have him write '5' on top of the working.

 

Ask him how many tens stamps did he distribute in total? There should be 25. Write it down in the working as shown above.

 

 

 

 

 

Remind him there were 26 tens stamps but he used only 25 stamps, hence there is 1 ten stamp left over as shown in the working.

 

Point out to the child that 1 ten is not enough to distribute to each of the skittle. Hence, he has to regroup or convert the ten into ones. He should now have 15 ones altogether.

 

 

 

Distribute all the one stamps to the skittles. Notice that there is no more stamps left. Show working:

 

 

 

Focus back to the working. Have the child count how many ones stamps did each skittle get. The answer should be '3'. Show in the working.

 

Also point out to the child that he had 15 ones stamps remaining and he has distributed all the 15 ones.

 

Have the child to count the number of stamps EACH skittle received. In this case, it is 53.

 

 

 

Point out to the child that there are no stamps left over. And the answer is 53.

 

Phew! I hope i didn't butcher the explanation. It is alot easier to explain in person then over the screen. If you intend to use this method to teach, you have to practise the steps out yourself first! Unless you are very certain, otherwise you will find yourself fumbling over throughout the lesson and you will lose your child's interest or worse, trust. If you didn't understand a single thing from the above, you can try studying the Singapore textbook, 'My Pals' for Primary 3 level.

 

Some things to note before embarking this lesson, the child must have a good grasp of the place values (2 hundreds is the same as 20 tens etc). He must be able to understand the meaning of division. It is important the child has a good foundation in his basics. Sonshine is able to grasp this because he was first taught the basics, read here. So he was able to understand the above concept very fast.

 

It may take a while for the child to 'see'. Practise makes perfect! Sonshine took this explanation very well and because of this method, he can now do long division regrouping mentally. All thanks to Montessori's very clear and visual explanation!

Tray activities for Doll

Yesterday I prepared some tray activities for Doll. When she came home and saw the trays, she immediately wanted to work on them. That's the beauty of Montessori, it's invites the child to play and learn. No need for strict routines, it's a natural process. 

The activities I prepared weren't anything academic, it was more to remind her the beauty of 'work'.

Looping the rubber bands around the bottle to work on that fine motor skills. 

Using ice cream sticks to form shapes. Its a good way for them to learn the differences in each shape ie triangle has  sides while a square has four. 

Using an aided chopstick to transfer poms poms into ice cube tray. 

As usual I simple couldn't forgo counting activities. Since Doll has learn to count to 30, I wanted her to practise.  So I prepared her only two boxes (didn't want to overwhelm her) of buttons. She had to count each boxes.  One she had to count up to 26 and another 30. 

I love that she enjoyed herself and didn't see these as 'work'. I hope I can keep this up. These days taking care of two school going kids keeps my schedule very tight and exhausting.