[blindkid] Math for Kindergarten

[L]

Thank you all for your help with my math question.  I am going to sit down and talk with my daughter's TBVI.  Hannah is pretty typically developing and is doing well with her braille reading and writing, so everything you all said makes sense!  My first thought when the TVI told me what she was doing was "I'm sure there are other kindergarteners that don't know all their letters and numbers either, but they are still learning it!"...so you all just confirmed that.  It is so nice to be able to put things out there on this list and get the help you need.  THANK YOU AGAIN!  Laurie Wages


From: Carol Castellano <carol.joyce.castellano at gmail.com>
To: "NFBnet Blind Kid Mailing List, (for parents of blind children)" <blindkid at nfbnet.org> 
Sent: Wednesday, January 4, 2012 9:30 AM
Subject: Re: [blindkid] Math for Kindergarten

As Joe Cutter used to say, "It's too soon, it's too soon, it's too 
soon.  Until it's too late."
Carol

At 11:24 PM 1/3/2012, you wrote:
>Hi all,
>As a blind adult and lifelong Braille reader I absolutely and totally
>agree with all the above. She should be learning to read and write
>numbers at the same time her sighted classmates learn, or before they
>do, but definitely not after. There is no harm in teaching or exposing
>a child to something before she is ready to perform perfectly at it,
>but there can be a lot of harm in waiting until she has fallen behind.
>Given the difficulties in getting accessible materials, pull-outs etc.
>a blind child needs to be ahead of the game as much as is possible.
>My father has a math degree, and when I was young he liked to talk to
>me a lot about numbers and computations. I recall when I was about
>four, sitting on his lap and him trying to teach me about
>multiplication. I was still in preschool, was barely learning to read
>and definitely didn't understand what he was talking about. Yet when I
>got to elementary school and my class was learning about
>multiplication, the ideas seemed familiar and I caught on right away.
>Although I wasn't developmentally ready to multiply in my head when my
>dad first introduced me to the concept, the exposure primed me to
>grasp the ideas more easily when I was developmentally ready for them.
>He could have just said "I'll wait until she is older to teach her
>about this, she won't understand" but he went ahead and exposed me to
>the concepts anyway. As a result, I didn't struggle with math and in
>fact was able to succeed in advanced math classes, and I don't think
>this was an accident or the result of innate intelligence. I will
>never forget this experience because it shows that early exposure to
>intellectual challenges can be incredibly beneficial for later growth
>and success. And this is especially true for blind kids in
>mainstreamed classrooms who face access disadvantages.
>Unfortunately many TVI's seem to subscribe to the model of waiting
>until a student is clearly ready to master a concept before
>introducing it. This way of thinking is not unlike the tendency to
>wait to teach Braille until a child clearly has no other choice. But a
>good teacher needs to anticipate what comes ahead-and to have a little
>faith in their students.
>Also, while I am not a Braille teaching expert, I would think that a
>child could easily learn literary numbers and Nemeth code at the same
>time-much as an infant can learn to speak English and Spanish at the
>same time. Or, if your TVI is really worried that your daughter will
>get confused by writing in Nemeth, why not have her write the numbers
>in literary Braille first-but still have her write them down like the
>other students?
>Best,
>Arielle
>
>On 1/3/12, Wendy Molle <wmolle at schoharie.k12.ny.us> wrote:
> > Unless a child has developmental delays, they should absolutely be doing
> > Nemeth math when the peers are doing written math.  Sighted children learn
> > the many different ways that a letter can be formed (a versus a versus A,
> > for example) as well as cursive or script eventually.
> >
> > If they don't keep her up with her peers, exactly when do they 
> plan to catch
> > her up?  With all of the pullouts our blind kids have a school (TVI, OM,
> > etc.), there is hardly extra time to catch them up later.
> >
> > Make it a game at home.  Buy dominoes and put the Nemeth numbers on them.
> > Then play dominoes together.
> >
> > Good luck,
> > Wendy
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>
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