What maths can your 7 1/2 year old actually do?

[TwoPlusTwoEqualsFive]

Sorry if similar question has been asked before but not happy with current school (not UK) and want to know if this is "normal" or what an average-ability child should be aspiring to at this age:

• Basic addition, numbers up to 20. Recognises units of ten 20, 30, 40 etc. but can't add them
  
• Basic subtraction, numbers up to 10. Struggles with anything above 11.
  

That's it.
Should I be doing something about this?

[firstgreatholswiththree]

p.s I was more concerned about the writing side of things because they didn't get much practise our previous country. It was definitely harder for me to work out levels in that area to. The bit to watch out for with home tutoring for maths (from my experience) is that they need to understand not only the maths but how and when to apply it.

[firstgreatholswiththree]

Can you find a teacher that knows the UK curriculum out there? What 1 hour of extra help can give your child is quite a lot at this age. Having moved countries I would have started with a tutor if I could have found one but I do have two others to look after and it was hard work to fit in time with our first child (year 3). Maths Whizz has really helped DD and has given us an idea of what sort of things they are covering.

[ForYourDreamsAreChina]

To be honest I stopped looking at the UK equivalents at the same time as I chucked the Oxford reading scheme on the bonfire thinking if I had to read one more time about blimmin' Kipper and Skipper and whatever other daft names they have I might just lose the will to go on....My child's English spelling is up the creek (as might be expected given its non-regularity compared to Italian) but I'm not worrying about that as I think the more she reads, the more naturally the spelling will come IYSWIM?

Let us know how you go on this year when the school starts again, as Franca says there is a big difference between prima and seconda, and I've been told, an even bigger one once they get into terza...(I'm imagining being on the phone all afternoon to Italian mamma friends asking them to help me!!)

[TwoPlusTwoEqualsFive]

Wow. So your DC is above her peer group in the UK for English?! That's really impressive. I now have massive inferiority complex as mine - who is very good at Italian - can only manage book 5 of Peter and Jane and can't write English words with more than 3 letters.

[ForYourDreamsAreChina]

I have just been in the UK and have bought some of the Lett's key stage books (mainly for English, as of course in Italy apart from numbers and contents of pencil cases, they aren't doing much) and looking at where my child seems to be I went for the age 9-10 books rather than the 7-8 which is their actual age IYSWIM?

[munstersmum]

These start at easy addition & feel like more fun than worksheets.
www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks1bitesize/numeracy/

[Francagoestohollywood]

zzz, no here they go over their time tables for months, until they dream it at night

Twoplus, sounds like a good strategy. As I said, they do take it slow the first year. Wait until they are in terza, and you'll miss the fluffy, chilled out first year (ime)

[TwoPlusTwoEqualsFive]

Also thanks ZZZen I will look at number bonds, this is very helpful.

[TwoPlusTwoEqualsFive]

OK. I'll give it until Christmas before panicking totally. I will try and talk to the teacher about class progress but already know the answer will be blamed on the (very small) number of non-Italian speaking children in the class. But you never know, the teacher might have developed a proactive helpful attitude over the summer break. Meanwhile I'll have a look at the Bond books because that's how I used to do mental arithmetic, thanks RLD.

[ZZZenAgain]

If she has just had one year of school, it is not dramatic. However if there is any difficulty for her in adding/subtracting numbers up to 20, I think yes, you should intervene and sort that out by working on number bonds up to 10, then number bonds up to 20. We had little houses with two columns and a pointy roof on top. In one column are 1,2,3 etc; in the other 9, 8, 7 so you see 1 corresponds with 9. Had to get dd to write those up every day and then they had those little houses with missing numbers which needed to be filled in. From there they went on to addition/subtraction. I thought it was very badly taught and really had to start from scratch to sort it all out.

In the second year, presumably they do times tables and I found I had to teach my dd those at home myself. Whatever they did at school achieved little in the end. I expect because dd needed a lot of repetition.

[Francagoestohollywood]

"(e.g. adding tens and untis seperately: 12 plus 46 equals 10 plus 40 and 2 plus 6)": this is a strategy that is taught at the beginning of seconda here in Italy.

[Francagoestohollywood]

Tesmallprint, I don't think it's the case, as we don't do "streaming" here in Italy usually.

[RunningAllDay]

Don't panic. My DD (7yrs3mnths) cannot do all said above (just started yr 3, which is the 4th year of primary, though maths in Reception class is pretty basic). She can do 2 3, 5 and 10 times tables, but not the others; mentally add/subtract numbers upto 100, division by explanation. Simple graphs and Venn diagrams. Can tell the time on an analogue clock but we have ongoing battles about converting to digital time. Similar to izzy1020. She's in a regular state primary, and although in the bottom half of the class for maths, is no dummy. In her previous primary (before June this year) she was in the top quarter of the class - and there was a very big range in both.

Because we did change her school and she had a wobble about being terrible at maths (similar reactions to your daughter) - when she isn't - we did maths books over the summer. We have done Carol Vorderman ones before but I found them a bit superficial. We did the Bond ones instead which I found better and gave her lots of confidence with her strategies (e.g. adding tens and untis seperately: 12 plus 46 equals 10 plus 40 and 2 plus 6). I have found that we do need to stay on top of it (reward charts etc) as she would happily not even try!

Hope things go better for your daughter this year! Good luck :)

[TheSmallPrint]

Twoplus, maybe your daughter is struggling with maths a little and her teacher is setting the easier work to try and ease her along? I really think you need to sit down with her (if you can) and discuss your concerns.

[Francagoestohollywood]

I totally agree with Agony, and I also prefer the European system of starting formal education a bit later.

I do however understand your worries, mainly because the Italian primary school system (which used to perform very well in all European scales) is suffering immensely from the cuts and "reforms" of the last 3 yrs.

I am dreading the start of this academic year, as I still don't know if dd will have the same math teacher as last year, and ds will have a new one, the 3rd in 4 yrs.

[TwoPlusTwoEqualsFive]

Well ForYourDreams I can only go on my gut instinct which is telling me they are definitely on the under-achieving side. They are using a book called Linea del Venti - I've just read the blurb on the back and it says "especially recommended for children who have problems in adding and subtracting". With a below-average class size of only 22 I cannot see why there should be any problems.
And yes, I want to know what is age-appropriate for DD, i.e. what an average 7-yo can learn with proper teaching. If she's behind now, what on earth will happen if I do finally manage to get her into secondary-school education in the UK. I'm seriously considering extra tuition now, I don't want to turn into pushy uber-mum but at the same time maths is so important and I don't want her to struggle with it for years.

[Francagoestohollywood]

I think Twoplus your problem might rest in the teacher, rather than the Italian curriculum. Is she di ruolo, or are there any chances she might not be there this year?

And just to reassure you with regards to homework during the summer holidays: ds really struggled with his after his first yr at school. He just didn't want to do them as he was knackered and despite the fact that he was really good at math and he loved his math teacher!

I'd wait and see, if she is only starting seconda. I can assure you that the second yr there is a significant change in what they do in all the subjects (wait until they start grammar ...)

[AgonyBeetle]

There's a lot of differentiation in UK primary schools. My dd's Y3 class (age 7) will have children who can read big fat books fluently, right down to dc who are struggling with three words per page.

Similarly with maths, there will be dc who know all their times tables (will have learnt this at home though, rather than at school - it's actually not that hard to teach once they've got the idea) but I'd put good money there are still dc who can't reliably recall addition facts to 20, and possibly to 10.

The UK system is good for dc who are keen and ready to learn and have had a lot of input at home, but can make others feel like failures early on because it takes them a bit longer to get up to speed. There's a good argument to be made for starting a bit later with formal teaching on the basis that the process will then be much faster. They do all catch up, and lots of EU countries have secondary school pupils at higher maths levels than the UK.

Basic maths, like reading and writing, is not a particularly high-order skill - kids with moderate learning difficulties can get the hang of it perfectly well. Dc who are introduced to it later will on the whole just zip through it more quickly. Think of it as a bit like potty training - if dc are ready to be dry at 2.5 on average, you can start at 2.4 and it will take a month. Or you can start at 1.5 and it will take a year to get to the same point, with lots of argument, upset and wet pants along the way.

fret not.

[izzy1020]

My child is age 7.2 and cannot do all the times tables as stated above. Nor is it an expectation for the end of year 2/start of year 3.
i think considering your child has only been in school 1 year it would almost certainly not be an expectation for your child.
Mine can count forward's/backward's in 2's, 5's and 10's, mentally add/subtract numbers up to 20, on paper add/subtract numbers up to 100. My child can do division by explaining it as sharing. eg 20 shared by 4.
I have no reason to worry they are behind(report says spot on) as I have 2 elder children who have achieved very well at primary and secondary so please don't worry.
Here is a link to a list of objectives for each UK year group //www.counton.org/resources/numeracy/pdfs/keyobj.pdf

[ForYourDreamsAreChina]

Another thought, what coursebook does your daughter use OP? My child's coursebook for maths is part of the Scopro series by Giunti and they had one for the first year and one for the second year. Even the first year one (IIRC) went way beyond what you have listed and they finished all of that some time before the end of prima.

It sounds to me to be more that the teacher doesn't care much for maths so doesn't really push it (which I can understand, because I'd be the same) but it's not helping the children.

[ForYourDreamsAreChina]

I am also in the same country as franca and you, OP, and also a namechanger. My child is the same age, give or take, and did all that franca listed plus started on some division stuff at the end of last term.

My child's maestra prevalente is a maths graduate and it is her thing though, so she might be pushing them above and beyond the curriculum. (no bad thing as maths is so not my thing!) but I'd certainly be questioning why your child is doing what seems to be so little.

It's hard to compare an Italian primary with a UK one as regards "years", as the children my child's age in the UK are just starting year 3 (if we don't count reception, in which case it would be their 4th year of full time education) so to look at what a UK child would be doing, I'm guessing we would need to look, not at what a yr 1-2 child would be doing, but what a yr 3-4 child would? Which surely would be a heck of a lot more than what the OP's child seems to be doing?

[TwoPlusTwoEqualsFive]

thanks smallprint I already have similar carol vorderman workbooks and a copy of the KS1 papers. She can't understand a lot of the stuff in the KS1 workbook so haven't even tried the tests yet. Also DS who's 18 months younger is extremely bright and can already do most of the things DD can which just makes her feel bad ... perhaps she needs a private tutor

[TheSmallPrint]

NB. There are lots of different publishers of these type of books - I am not promoting this one!!

[TheSmallPrint]

My 7.5yo DS is doing stuff as others have listed above but he has been at school for three years already and has just started his fourth year. If you are concerned - and have the time- why not get some books like this and do a bit at home with him? These are really nicely done books which make it quite fun.

[TwoPlusTwoEqualsFive]

actually I haven't been worrying too much, thinking it's ok she'll catch up. But over the summer holidays she just refused to do any maths homework - and it was really simple 2+2 stuff - saying she hates it and doesn't understand it, the teacher shouts and she doesn't see the point.
Other mums seem to have a similar attitude to me i.e. not stressing too much about the 1st year but it's more what we don't say about the teacher than what we do say... I know of one mum who has a child at the school but enrolled her 2nd child elsewhere because she didn't like the maths teacher. Trouble is I chose this school because our local one is even worse.