Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.3 alpha 4/15/85; site cbosgd.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!mark From: mark@cbosgd.UUCP (Mark Horton) Newsgroups: net.kids Subject: Re: Better Baby Institute Message-ID: <1180@cbosgd.UUCP> Date: Tue, 14-May-85 11:07:45 EDT Article-I.D.: cbosgd.1180 Posted: Tue May 14 11:07:45 1985 Date-Received: Wed, 15-May-85 02:11:11 EDT References: <49983@apple.UUCP> <56789@apple.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus, Oh Lines: 67 Mark Cutter's comments are insightful, and I appreciate being able to benefit from his experience. For the most part, I think I agree with him. For example, Matt is now beginning to develop the ability to read different fonts. Addition is coming slowly, and so far I think he's just memorizing addition tables. I do hope the rule will form in his mind from the examples, but so far it hasn't. One thing we're doing that Doman doesn't suggest is working with pennies. The are the same size and shape as the dots, and as long as the table they sit on (Matt does this stuff sitting at a wood desk) contrasts reasonably well, and the pennies are arranged in the same shape as the dots, he can recognize them. Using pennies allows me to change the shapes and to show addition much more graphically than the card method Doman suggests. One quibble: >>and what actually happens are quite different. Doman claims that the >>child is subconciously counting the dots, so that when he sees 37 sheep >>or 37 cars or 37 pennies he'll instantly know there are 37 there; he > >I don't believe that Doman would actually say this, since counting >involves a sequential activity. Doman says that kids learn quantity >without having to count. Quoting from page 95 of "Teach Your Baby Math" (paperback version), where he refutes common explanations others come up with to explain the child's apparent brilliance: 2. The child isn't actually perceiving the dots but instead is actually recognizing the pattern in which they occur. (Nonsense, he'll recognize the number of mem standing in a group, and who can keep people in a pattern? Besides, why can't *you* recognize the seventy-five patterns on the seventy-five dot cards he now knows at a glance?) I could swear there is a comment about sheep in there somewhere, too, but I can't grep the book. I'm inclined to go with Mark Cutter's analysis, but this is not how I read Doman's claim. Matt can recognize up to 4 objects reliably, in any shape. Up to 6, sometimes. Beyond 6, he depends on the shape. (This is the situation today, maybe it will change.) I showed him a greeting card yesterday with 11 Canadian geese on it, and asked him how many geese there were. He started to point his finger at it and count them. He missed half of them, partly because he doesn't have a system for keeping track of which ones he's counted, and partly because there were some groups of 2 and 3 geese he counted as one. As to Doman's last sentence above, when Matt and I were starting dots, he and I developed the ability to recognize the numbers up to 20 at about the same rate, and we were both recognizing patterns. Beyond 20, I changed methods so I could handle the cards faster (he's a whiz at recognizing dots, we're up to 44 now.) I now look at the backs of the cards (so I can read the numeral on the card) and don't see much of the fronts. I claim (without having actually tried it) that had I been looking at the fronts as much as Matt, I could do as well. If anyone out there is getting ready to do dots, I encourage you to try this and see if it's true. (You could put the card down on the desk rather than holding it up, this will be a bit slower but in retrospect it shouldn't matter, I hope.) Or have the other parent sit next to the child. Mark Horton