Double Checking
Having established such a firm foundation in number sense and visual memory, we can now turn our attention to the next task at hand. Double checking.
A word of caution: As with establishing any good habit, repetition plus patience is the key. Whenever you feel you’re losing it, walk away. There’s nothing worse than trading your child’s innate (often irreplaceable) curiosity with a temporary gain in result.
Some of the tricks that worked well for me (and other parents) are:
- set a timer ahead of time on how long you both agree to work.
- get an engaging book to rad while working with your child side by side, so that you don’t breathe down his/her neck.
- have a plan B ahead of time if you know you’re short on patience.
- Write down a trigger word on a note card and ask your child to “stick it in your face” when she is getting stressed out. Some of the effective words are:
“Love me”
“I’m only a child”
“I need a hug”
“remember my curiosity is more important”
“I’m tired”
I don’t recommend using rewards because I didn’t want my kids to associate “learning” to “chores”. To me, learning itself is rewarding. Think about it, if learning is equated with reward, then “no reward” is equivalent to “no learning”. There have been quite a few excellent books on intrinsic (like pride) reward vs. external reward (like candy and money) and how in the long run the extrinsic reward system slows down learning.