How to teach children to love Math

By: Victor Anthony V. Silva October 05,2015 - 12:56 AM

Believing that children should have a strong foundation in math in their early years, teacher Joanne Sison wrote a book that teaches kindergarten pupils about Singapore Math.
Singapore Math, which is based on the curriculum used in Singapore, is a graphical and conceptual approach that makes Math more understandable to all kinds of learners.
It became popular as a teaching method because Singapore consistently ranked first in the Trends in International Math and Science Study, an international measure of Math achievement among students.
Sison, co-founder of after-school enrichment program MatheMagis, launched her book “Math Genius: Success with Singapore Math for Kindergarten” after a Singapore Math seminar workshop at the Cebu Normal University (CNU) last Friday. A book for nursery pupils will be available by the end of 2015 for school year 2016-2017.
“If we are able to develop a love for Math at a very early age, then we’ve taken a giant step in preparing this generation to learn and handle more complex main topics with enthusiasm and skill,” she said.
This involves erasing the fear of Math and increasing students’ motivation through concrete and highly visual activities and developing sense with numbers in preschoolers, among others.
Sison said her book satisfies the requirements and adheres to the principles of the Department of Education’s (DepEd) K-to-12 program.
It begins by teaching children to count to 10 using frames.
“Look at the 10 frames below and write how many dots you see” and “I see four dots, I need _ more to make 10” are only some of the activity instructions kindergartners will encounter in Sison’s work text.
Math quantities and operations are shown in highly visual representations coupled with conceptual explanations before introducing abstract symbols.
This allows students to understand and relate quantities and symbols to real-life scenarios and use them in everyday conversations.
“Instead of using greater than or less than and their corresponding symbols (>, <), we say ‘more or less’,” said Sison.
She said many students turn away from Math because the subject simply doesn’t make sense to them.
The worktext covers whole numbers, operations, geometry, measurement, statistics, and fractions as per DepEd’s K-to-12 and Singapore Math’s requirements for the kindergarten curriculum.
Examples in the book are also set in the local context with drawing and graphics depicting local places and food, among others.
Sison wrote the book after she was approached by several preschool owners to look into their Math curriculum and help improve their Math programs.
“I wrote this book to help teachers follow a logical progression of spiraling topics, teach Math principles through concrete and visual representations first before using abstract concepts and to develop good number sense in preschools which lay the best foundation for stronger Math skills later on,” said Sison.
Singapore Math has been adopted in Manila since 2004 and has only been recently practiced in Cebu, particularly in Cambridge Child Development Centre and Sage Prep Schoolhouse.
Sison said she believes Filipino students can excel in Math with the proper teaching approach, appropriate learning materials and well-trained teachers.
“All these combined with a student’s positive attitude to learn through effort and practice will assure Filipino students of stronger math skills,” she said.
Sison has an undergraduate degree in Math and a Master’s degree in Family Life and Child Development.

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