Blogspot - Talk to Baby

      There is a growing sense of urgency in America that our children become math literate at younger ages, and that students of all ages understand math concepts better and that is coming clear down to kindergarten.      The good news is that it is easy to help young children be ready for the world of math.      So how do you go about teaching math to a preschooler?   The same way you help children learn colors and letters and anything else – about two minutes of fun at a time.    You don’t need flash cards, workbooks, or instructions manuals.   Just help children look at the world around them with a math perspective.      Half of the battle in learning math is understanding the vocabulary.   If you have a name for an object or concept you can learn what to do with it.   You might wonder about kindergarten children talking about the vertex on a triangle, we called them corners in ...

      One afternoon decades ago I sat with my Grandma Ruby on her green sofa and listened to her stories of childhood.   She laughed as she recalled how when it was time to wash up the dinner dishes her sister Pearl always seemed to disappear into the bathroom, and stay there long enough that the dishes were almost done when she came back.   I laughed.   I had similar experiences with sisters.      Some things don’t change. Even at preschool there are a few children who suddenly remember they need to go the bathroom when toy clean-up time is announced. Kids have been ditching out on clean up time for a long, long time.       Whether kids like it or not, cleaning up is perpetual because life is messy. Eating, playing, working, creating, and even making mistakes makes messes.   Most of us at some point have wished there were elves or magic or mothers or someone to make them go away, but they just don’t. ...

    There is just no telling what you are going to hear come out of a four year old’s mouth.        One day in October some years ago a little girl ran over to me on the playground. Horror was on her face and she was so overwrought that she couldn’t talk.   She shook with breathless sobs.   My co-teacher and I looked her over, searching for wounds, gushing blood, broken limbs, something that would help us understand what was wrong.       “Take a breath and try to tell us what happened,” we teachers said.   “Where do you hurt?   What’s wrong?”   But she just shook and cried.   We had no clue.      After several minutes of asking questions that got no answers we called over the little girls who had been playing nearby to see if they knew anything.   Timidly, two little girls came to us.   The tiniest girl in the class looked at me with quivering lips and she tried to ex...