Last minute addition

We were on one of our family nature walks a few evenings ago when Tiger got through his multiplication facts, as well as negative numbers.  This happened casually when Tortoise was playing a numbers game with him as we walked.

Based on our math curriculum, multiplication has not been formally introduced yet while negative numbers are done as the very last lesson of Level C, but we had spent the past two years (starting from Level A) working on additions, so that had formed the basis for Tiger to understand that both multiplication and negative numbers are not much more than addition "flipping forwards and backwards" (Tiger's words).

Tiger was very pleased that he was able to figure out the correct answers to the game that he wanted to play it over and over again the following day, so I got "Mum, ask me another multiplication question!" and "Mum, I know what's minus such-and-such number minus/add such-and-such number is!" over lunch, during break time, and while cooking.  I guess that's his multiplication basics done.

Last night while playing chess, Tiger and Tortoise's conversation somehow turned from figuring out the number of squares on the chess board to division to binary numbers, then to fractions.  Tiger understood binary numbers and how to work them out - which was a reinforcement on yet another way to apply multiplication facts.  However, he seemed a little muddled about fractions but was very keen to learn it.  I looked at our Level C book, and found that fraction does not get introduced until near the end of the book in Lesson 133.

While I continue to believe in RightStart's approach to build solid foundations in mathematical understanding, I do not want to hold Tiger back when he is showing a keen interest in a certain area.  So, here I am, scrambling around to get hold of appropriate materials to teach fractions starting from next week, while figuring out how much time to take out of our schedule to tackle this new topic.

I like visuals and manipulatives in maths, so I will be printing out the Fraction Circles and Fraction Strips to introduce the concept to Tiger, as we skip ahead to the fraction lessons in Level C while waiting for Key to Fractions Book 1: Faction Concepts to arrive...