Is there a way of teaching my daughter without her knowing she's being taught???

[mummyloveslucy]

Hi, my daughter will be comming out of school at Christmas, she's in year 1.
She has SEN's and I know it's going to be very hard to teach her at home. She's quite good at coppying writing and she's learning her letter sounds at the moment. She just can't seem to grasp maths at all though. She can count to 12 reliably, but if you say "what's 1+1?" She won't have a clue.

She dosn't like school and is really worried that she can't do her maths and she dosn't understand what she has to do. the teacher thinks she's being stuborn and refusing to work, but i think she genuinly dosn't understand sometimes.

At home, it's very hard to get her motivated to do any work, unless she sees it as a game. Is there anything we could do to improve her knowledge of nombers without her knowing IYKWIM. Or even her writing/reading??? She's into Jayne and the dragon big time at the moment, so I thought of doing some maths with that as a theme, but i'm really not that inventive.

Is there any websites with really good ideas as to how to encourage learning without them knowing it? She's not a natural learner at all. She dosn't ask questions and isn't really interested in the world around her unless it directly effects her eg, are we seing Grandma today.

I think I'm going to find this home ed lark extreamly hard, so any advice would be really great. We will be applying to schools in the mean time in case it dosn't work out.

Go for a multi sensory approach , less formal teaching and more exploration and activity based. A friend who was an ex-primary teacher and has home edded her dd's on and off recommended Channel 4's Number Crew to us and gave us a few videos, sadly long since mislaid and I suspect in short supply apart form 2nd hand. Example here Also you might find tactile props such as cubes and Cuisineaire Rods useful. Encourage her to make collections of things - conkers, acorns etc then she can count them and you ask one less/one more , how many in total, grab a handfula dn guess how many then count. Exlpore the BBC schools website as they often have games that tie in with their programming.

For things like addition you can do "I need one plate for me and one plate for you, how many plates is that?" Then you get them out of the cupboard saying "one plate for mummy and one plate for lucy", and put them on the table going "one plate, two plates" If you do that often with various different things and numbers, she'll start to see what you mean and be able to work out how many that is. Don't try to explain "adding" or what a "+" means on paper till she gets the idea of what it is and why anyone would want to do it.

Then you can move on to "taking one away" from collections of things, then taking different numbers away, then eventually work your way up to multiplying and dividing.

Since she has SEN you may find that some things need to be repeated more than you might think, or that she really doesn't get it in which case you might be best to leave the whole idea for 6 months as she might then have developed a bit further and understand thinsg she didn't before.

thank you. That sounds great. At the moment, she's being made to complete maths sheets at school that look somethink like this: 1+2= 4-1= etc. I think she's being put off maths at the moment, she dosn't really understand or see the point of it.
It's a great idea to show her why we do it, so that it makes more sense to her.

I would just play lots and lots of games, using 2 dice is addition.....that kind of thing.

If you look around your local area you may find a "tutor" who will help you work out what and how to teach her and it still be cheaper than school fees.

Ask on your local netmums (shhh) or similar for recommendations of tutors specialised in SEN.

Hello MLLucy, yes worksheets with sums on can be a bit bland and for a child who is 6 years it can be too abstract.

Orchard games make some great maths games for children. Toy shops or ebay is a great place to find maths games.

The maths together books are very good.

Could you try incorperating maths into other activities. I have always found measuring for carpet, pacing the garden, growing seeds etc, a good practical way of introducing space and measurment.

Hello mumyloveslucy, lots of great suggestions already. Another idea is to make your own board games centred around their interests, so jane & the dragon (what is that btw, a TV prog?). You say you are not that inventive, but even something simple would be great & young kids prob wont notice whether its very inventive or not!
If you want, I will happily make one for you (to start you off!) & send it? Will prob take me a couple of weeks & no charge! You will just have to back it onto card when you get it & get a dice and counters.
Let me know if you want me to do this. It would be my pleasure.
Sarah

Sorry had to dash off to deal with DS2.

Collecting things that interest your daughter and then counting them is a good idea, try to use lots of maths language, more than, less, larger, smaller, add, total of, sum of etc,,

Tea parties are good for multiplication and division. Helping with cooking, you can teach fractions, division, basic multiplication, weights and measures, adding.

I would second the board game idea. Ones with 2 dice and/or games like snakes and ladders where they are actually adding and taking away without even realising :)

I also agree with muminscotland about just counting things aloud in everyday life. You'd be surprised how much it comes up - cooking, art projects(cutting out a certain number of shapes - how many do we need?/ how many have we got? etc) Multiplication came in with the baking trays of all things! 3 x 4 rows = 12 muffins! :) and then dividing them up between everyone - how many will each person get etc....I think it's much more useful to apply these things in real life anyway so you can see their purpose rather than just seeing numbers on a page. It can make math seem a lot more worthwhile and interesting rather than something they just have to learn iykwim. :)

Yamba- Thank you, that's so kind of you! I wouldn't want you to go to all that trouble though. I can't believe how kind people are on here.

Thanks everyone else, there are some great ideas. I'll save this page.

I'm actually looking forward to her comming out of school. It'll be nice not to have to rush in the mornings. I can teach her to dress herself etc without stress. She's starting Stagecoach in January too, so that'll be good for her.

Can I second the Cuisenaire rods. You can see how numbers relate to each other without even using numbers. Because each size is a different colour, you can refer to colours instead - how many reds make up an orange? How long are 2 greens together?

They are also very versatile - you can use them for algebra and fractions, area and perimeter later on!

Nothing to do with maths but you might want to look at the Evan Moor site - they have lovely 'History Pockets' which my DCs really love.

I found giving a small amount of pocket money was very motivating in getting DS1 to think about numbers, trying to work out how long he'd have to save for match attax or some sweets. The Argos catalogue was also good for getting an idea of numbers. We also played lots of dice games (including Shut the Box) and card games. You might want to check Teacher's TV, they sometimes have good short programmes that might help. We also use BBC Bitesize and even CBeebies Numberjacks is helpful. Sharing smarties out between siblings or friends. Measuring her height, her feet and hands and yours. Really just as many real life number activities as you can think of.

Really no trouble! Id enjoy doing it, I make them for my kids. PM address if interested. Otherwise if youd rather have a go yourself, just take a board game idea, like snakes & ladders as someone suggested & give it a 'jane & dragon' theme.

You'll also find lots of maths board games in the kids mags that you might find would be perfect.

ive just bought some cuisenaire rods after reading about them on here, they arrived this morning and we've had great fun with them already

If you want to do practical maths cooking is really useful - you can do two eggs (1+1) etc, plus weights and halving and doubling. You also get to read recipes.

my dds got interested in maths from spending their birthday money

honestly, they were v v aware of any tricks to get them to "do maffs". Best things I've found- apart from giving them a couple of quid to spend in a gift shop!- are computer games

you might want to try Topmarks maths games- there's a huge amount of stuff on there, it's free and the quality is high. That's how we started- and now dds are more confident in maths than just about any other area

...wish I was

I was going to recommend orchard toys board games too, they are great value.

I have cuisenaire rods too, and my friend is getting DD a numicon starter set.

What about things like lacing beads so you can talk about patterns? There's a lot more to maths than arithmetic :)

On a serious note though, it sounds like you will need a period of deschooling when she leaves. If she doesn't like school, and has no confidence in her maths ability, she probably needs a good break.

I agree she needs to deschool. I am also a big supporter of unschooling - especially with children who have special needs. You will find it hard if you try to 'teach' her things - she will probably fight you every step of the way if she smells an agenda. Whereas if you just follow her interests, answer all her questions and strew her path with interesting things she will learn on how own time in her own way, and life will be a lot more peaceful.

This is what I did with my son and honestly life is so much better now than when we did school, and then school-at-home.

I really hope that helps.
Chaley.