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How do I get Evangeline to slow down?
We've been having the nieces do "extra math" because NYC schools put a big emphasis on reading and I think math really suffers a little. Especially when the kids are already reading at or above grade level.
We didn't finish their workbooks during the school year, we're doing that now, and starting up with math games and all again because if nothing else, this summer Ana has got to, got to, GOT TO start memorizing some of her addition and subtraction facts. She has to count on her fingers, and then she gets frustrated that it slows her down and she drops her pencil.
If Ana works at the pace she's going, one exercise a day (which is more than she would be doing during the school year, there are more days than assignments), she'll pretty much be done by the time school starts in September. One workbook is half a year, we started late in the second half of the year, that's about right.
If Evangeline works at the pace she's going, 3+ pages a day, she'll be done with first grade math by the time she enters first grade.
She is ahead of where her sister was at that age, at that point in school (remember, Ana entered kindy half a year older than her sister entered did!), heck - she's ahead of where Ana was in the middle of her first grade year already!
I have tried talking to her, imploring her to slow down. "No thanks!" I've tried taking away her math and giving her on-level books to read to me. I've tried hiding her math, which is just deeply surreal.
I love this child. I don't understand her. HELP ME.
(Also, I love Ana, but she has got to stop with the fingers. I know the school didn't emphasize memorizing, and I know they have a really valid reason for that, but I also know that Ana is getting really really convinced that because she can't do math fast she's not good at it, and that's not the case. But you can't convince that child of anything. Best thing for her is lots of very cleverly disguised drill. Next year is not going to be very fun.)
We didn't finish their workbooks during the school year, we're doing that now, and starting up with math games and all again because if nothing else, this summer Ana has got to, got to, GOT TO start memorizing some of her addition and subtraction facts. She has to count on her fingers, and then she gets frustrated that it slows her down and she drops her pencil.
If Ana works at the pace she's going, one exercise a day (which is more than she would be doing during the school year, there are more days than assignments), she'll pretty much be done by the time school starts in September. One workbook is half a year, we started late in the second half of the year, that's about right.
If Evangeline works at the pace she's going, 3+ pages a day, she'll be done with first grade math by the time she enters first grade.
She is ahead of where her sister was at that age, at that point in school (remember, Ana entered kindy half a year older than her sister entered did!), heck - she's ahead of where Ana was in the middle of her first grade year already!
I have tried talking to her, imploring her to slow down. "No thanks!" I've tried taking away her math and giving her on-level books to read to me. I've tried hiding her math, which is just deeply surreal.
I love this child. I don't understand her. HELP ME.
(Also, I love Ana, but she has got to stop with the fingers. I know the school didn't emphasize memorizing, and I know they have a really valid reason for that, but I also know that Ana is getting really really convinced that because she can't do math fast she's not good at it, and that's not the case. But you can't convince that child of anything. Best thing for her is lots of very cleverly disguised drill. Next year is not going to be very fun.)
no subject
Especially my Asian-American students tend to have lots of math help outside of school, so they're ahead of their peers, and I've never noticed it hurting them at all. It's nice to have something you're good at, and being better at it is often a motivation to keep working on it.
I worry that forcing someone to slow down when they've got the aptitude might turn them off to the subject, or to academics in general. And there's the problem where gifted children often never learn to really work, or to handle challenging situations, because they just never encounter things that are actually hard. That was a real problem for a bunch of my college friends, and some of my students struggle with it.
no subject
Luckily, I only had that experience in some subjects and not others (math was a partial exception, for example), so my problem was thinking I'd never have to work "at X" and not "at anything" - and even that was plenty hard to overcome.
Holding someone back to match their peers teaches laziness, in my experience. I've had to work to unlearn it.