Math: Not Our Favorite, But We're Gonna Rock It! (Videos)

I remember when I was teaching....my students with Down Syndrome almost always struggled more in math than in reading. I always hate to make generalizations like that, but from my experience it almost always held true! Interestingly enough, when I looked into this further, there is research that shows people with Down Syndrome achieve a higher level in reading than in math, so there are some facts supporting my observation. Not surprisingly, I'm finding with Zoya (and her teacher is as well) that math is just not her favorite :) She will choose any other activities over math activities in the classroom and at home! I try to incorporate math activities into other activities and do short spurts of math work as not to frustrate her (or me haha) too much! I also try to do a lot of games that incorporate math skills! Both my students with special needs and students without special needs LOVED learning math through games!

I have recently pulled out my "Teaching Math to People with Down Syndrome..." book after it took a little vacation in a box in the basement! I used this book a lot when I was teaching, and it's been helpful once again as I figure out how to best help Zoya in the area of math! I really did forget how much I love this book! It has a lot of great ideas to make math more concrete rather than abstract for our kids! (On a side note, there is also a "Teaching Reading to Children with Down Syndrome" book in this same series that is also very helpful!)

I've been researching some math programs that might be best for Zoya and have narrowed it down to a couple. One of those is Numicon and the other is Math-U-See. I'm going to continue looking into both...but if you have experience with either of these programs with a child with Down Syndrome, I'd love to hear about your experience!

Some of the beginning concepts we've been working on include rote counting to 20, arranging numbers 1-10 in order, 1-1 correspondance, more and less, counting items up to 10 items, telling how many are in a set after counting them, understanding zero, and completing patterns.  The very most basic concepts that we started with that Zoya has now mastered are matching and sorting by color, size, and other attributes, showing one more, simple comparisons (more or less, big or little, same or different), and identifying written numbers 1-20. So that is the foundation on which we are building.

I took a few videos today while I was working with Zoya. You can see that I pretty much adapt as I go and see needs or see that she isn't understanding.

Here is Zoya working on ordering numbers 1-10. I got this cool wooden number block set on Zulily before Christmas! I LOVE it and we use it for lots of different math activities!

Here we are working on "what comes next." If you noticed in the first video, Zoya keeps going back to number 1 to start counting all over again. I don't discourage it because it helps her practice counting, but she has difficulty counting on. So practicing "what comes next" will help her to count up from a certain number. 

This was the first time I attempted to use this tool for 1-1 correspondence. As you can see, she struggled to grasp the concept....so after this I gave her a little break and came up with a tool that would help her understand this concept a bit better. You'll see that in the video after this one! 

In this video, you can see the tool I came up with to help her! I just drew a grid on some paper and cut it out so it showed one square per number (1 square after the #1 block, 2 squares after the #2 block). I like this because you can see how she looks at the squares for the first few and is able to grab that many counters to match. Without this tool she had no idea how many to grab for the number and kept getting distracted by having to grab one at a time and count. I also like the grid because I could easily turn it the other way and have the numbers along the side instead of the top. In hindsight I'd have used a different color paper since it blends in with the table (or put a different colored mat down under it). Also, I only made it go up to 7 because that's as big as my piece of paper was, and also...I won't move on to more until she masters these smaller numbers first. Once she does I'll just add on to this grid by tapping another sheet of paper to it! There are so many ways to practice this same concept, but I think this is going to be one of our favorites! 

And one last video. I dug this puzzle out of the basement and Zoya enjoys it. It's great for counting and ordering numbers. You could also do the above activity with this puzzle, putting the correct number of items under each train car number. I like it because it allows her to move around a bit more. Hands-on is the key for Zoya learning math, so with everything I do with her for math skills! 

Please let me know if these videos are helpful! I'm trying something new after a few blog readers requested some more videos of how I teach the girls. I'm passionate about teaching, since it was my first profession, and a bit of a nerd in that area, so I'm happy to share ideas. Just remember every child is different...what works for one of my children doesn't necessarily work for the others, so I'm constantly trying to adapt to their needs and figure out the best ways to help them understand the concepts! 

Fall Learning Fun!

We are staying dry and warm inside! School was cancelled because of Hurricane Sandy. This is definitely the first time school has ever been cancelled here for a hurricane HAHA! 

I've been meaning to post these pictures of a fun learning activity I did with the girls (mostly Zoya). 

I made my own lightbox with inspiration from THIS BLOG. The girls love it and there are so many different activities you can do with a light box!

This time, we used transparent pumpkins and leaves that I found in the dollar section of Target. First I just let Zoya play and explore (always a must with new materials....if I don't give her this time to play and explore new materials, the lesson is usually a bust!) Mila loved watching Zoya! Unfortunately these pieces were too small for Mila to play with (choking hazard). After Zoya played a bit, we read a couple of stories....one about Leaves and one about Pumpkins. 

 Zoya was practicing counting. She picked a number card and then placed that number of items under the card. She needed more help at the beginning but eventually caught on to this idea. 

 I did it!

 She decided to read through the leaf book on her own. I love watching Zoya read a book after I've read it to her. Typically she uses the pictures to retell the story and usually hits some main ideas with her retell. 

 She thought that page was funny I guess! 

 We worked on sorting by color. Zoya has this skill down, but it was a good review and also good practice to increase her time on task (which is one of her IEP goals at school too). 

 We've just started working on basic patterns. This concept (even alternating between two colors) is tough for Zoya. I think next time I will cut out color squares and make a paper pattern and have her put the correct color on the correct square. We need to back that concept up a bit! 

 The next morning we went outside and collected leaves and read our Leaves story again! 

I love making learning fun for my girls!