As I've said before, I don't think the nieces' school does enough math.

[conuly]

Honestly, I'm not sure any schools in the city do, they focus a lot on reading. (And come to think of it, I'm not sure they do enough science either, but that's another issue.)

So I've started going extra math with the nieces in the evening. Not much, but a few minutes here and there, that's my plan. Just as a supplement, right?

Yeah.

Ana goes "MORE math? REALLY?" and I know she needs to review basic math facts (I'm going to absolutely go through my Games with Math book and start doing one every day, she has got to get her addition and subtraction through 20 memorized, it'll make her life much easier) and sneaks books and changes the subject and generally tries to derail the whole process. (She also needs to work on freezing up when questions are initially hard looking or when she feels she has insufficient time, and on working out what to do with word problems.)

Evangeline goes "Can I do another? Can I do another?" and sneaks the workbooks away from me and does extra pages on her own time. She does stuff where, logically, she shouldn't know what to do because I haven't read the instructions - but she works it out anyway, automatically filling in the right letter to the box or whatnot. This is a girl who is just good at doing workbooks, who is just good at taking tests. It's not fair, you know? They're both more than smart enough, but Evangeline is going to be lucky through school if she continues being good at taking tests.

Of course, Evangeline is also reading now. Ana, of course, is into graphic novels. The other day we took car service (as we do every week) to the YMCA for swimming, and it was a blissful change from most weeks when they talk loudly, squabble, play "INVISIBLE PUNCHBUGGY NO HITBACKS!", fidget a lot, and generally test my patience. This week Ana took out two books, handed the first one in the series to her sister, took the second for herself, and they sat and read right up until I actually dragged Evangeline into the changing room. Evangeline mostly studied the pictures and sounded out a few words, but still - it was quiet! SO QUIET!

And since I'm being random, on the subject of changing rooms, is there a reason I'm the only one who insists my little kidlet change in and out of her own clothes? It's not like the people "helping" their kids are getting out of there any faster than I am. And am I wrong for thinking it's a bit absurd (I'd say daft, but it's not actually in my dialect and would sound weird if I did say it) that, in the girl's changing room, where Evangeline is the oldest child (boys can go in up until the age of six, but the other children in the room were all 4 and under), people are holding up towels for their kids to change behind, and shooing them back behind the towels? Isn't under six (under 4!) a bit young for that sort of affected modesty in a changing room? Am I weird for the fact that I don't object to Evangeline just, you know, changing her clothes in the normal way? (And when she's older and starts asking for that sort of modesty, isn't that what the separate changing areas in the women's locker room are for? That's certainly why Ana changes in there - she dislikes the chance of being in a room even with small boys to change, and she likes having a separate, closed-off stall to change in if she pleases.) For that matter, there are two (two!) closed-off single-stall bathrooms in the girl's changing room, and four shower stalls. If this level of modesty is really needed, wouldn't it make more sense to just appropriate one of them for a few minutes rather than do the whole "behind-the-towel" dance? It makes sense in a public area like the playground or the beach, but in the actual changing room?

I mean, it's not like I'm letting Evangeline run around the place naked, but for the brief moments between off with the bathing suit and on with the panties (let alone her actual clothing, by which point I really don't care), does it matter if she's, well, naked? In the changing room? AM I THE WEIRD ONE HERE?

(It may just be this group. LAST session we had swimming on Wednesdays, and though there was much "helping", nobody did the towel thing that I saw. THIS session we're on Tuesdays, different group of kids, and it was towels all over the place.)

Comments

feebeeglee

[https://profiles.google.com/feebeeglee]

Have you considered Addition War? My kids love it. Also Subtraction War, Multiplication War, Division War...

http://letsplaymath.net/2006/12/29/the-game-that-is-worth-1000-worksheets/

[tsukikage85.livejournal.com]

I remember when I was rather young and at an outdoor swimming pool in Germany, my mom either made fun of me either for wanting her to hold a towel around me while I changed, or for wanting to change in one of the changing tents rather than with the towel, I can't remember which. She also always had us shower and change at the YMCA in the open and naked, rather than in a stall or washing under our swimsuits. Actually, I never had a problem with the YMCA thing, since it was a women's only changing room. Come high school and I never learned that maybe I should act as the Romans in the changing room during P.E. and went traipsing around the changing room getting stuff I needed or whatever. I still shower and change openly in those situations but try to minimize my random naked wandering.

[leora.livejournal.com]

I think it's odd that so many parents are doing it. If one parent were doing it, I might assume that child had issues with nudity and that was simply what that family had worked out as the simplest way to deal with it. But if lots of them are doing it, it does seem unlikely that many kids really have some issue with simply changing, unless their parents encouraged it.

On the other hand, sometimes parents do encourage it, because it can be really annoying having kids who want to run around naked. So, when trying to stop your kid from constantly taking their clothes off, you can sometimes overdo the you should wear clothing around others lesson.

[velvetchamber.livejournal.com]

I think the whole nakedness issue is intensely bizarre. But then again I come from a different culture. For swimming pools and gyms in Iceland there are two locker rooms, one for men and one for women. The the swimming pools kids up to around six go with their parents into either changing room, everyone takes their clothes off and walk naked with their towels in their hands to the showers. People shower, little naked kids run around and act like little kids do. People put on their bathing suits in the shower and then go and swim. Repeat in reverse after swimming. People who wrap towels around them are considered to suffer from unhealthily low self confidence and everyone feels sorry for them.

Also, going to shower without being stark naked is just icky. Showering before swimming is to keep the pool cleanish. Failing to do so is kind of rude. We have problems with foreigners not abiding this in the summer months so the guards in the changing rooms have a lot on their hands during tourist season.

It's not an American thing....

[marveen.livejournal.com]

...because around here that is indeed weird.

The last gym I belonged to, the swimming pool had a large open locker room with a few "private" stalls along one side. The stalls went pretty much unused except by the Mennonites or whoever (they swam wearing a suit, a pair of kneelength shorts and a long tshirt over it all), including by children. Everyone just stripped off right there, nobody stared or made remarks, and yes, one would undress next to the locker and then walk to the shower with one's towel.