Fingers are great ...
For picking up Mom’s fried chicken or pointing out the new Mustang or even for eating poi on a beach luau in Maui. Okay, maybe not the poi part, but they’re great for lots of things nonetheless.
But not so much as a method ofcounting. In fact, when kids think in terms of ones, they quickly hit a wall when trying to learn higher math ideas then struggle at the next levels because they are still stuck on the idea of ones.
One way to help them understand other ideas than counting ones is to show them that counting can be done sort of like a puzzle. The bigger the shape, the faster we can count.
For example, I took a block of 10 square blocks and set them in front of my Goddaughter. Then I took 4 blocks and set them next to the block of 10. Then I asked her, without counting, to find blocks to fill in the blank spots so they end up the same length.
We did this regularly. In a short time, she began to adopt the idea of quantity as a unit to get a result then noticing how many that took as a unit instead of finding a number through the operation of counting by ones. It put the goal front and center visually and tactilely and feels effortless. Moving to higher number blocks reinforced the idea that bigger numbers are not harder, we just need more blocks to fill in!
We can now leave finger counting behind and move on to bigger things.
-Carlo
(775) 356-6284
(775) 997-4815
