Fuzzy Math

February 02, 2009

When we think about preparing our littlest ones for literacy and a life-long love of reading, parents know more or less what to do. Read, read, read. Simple! When we think about preparing our babies and preschoolers to enjoy math, however, many of us are not quite as certain about how to proceed. Why? Perhaps because when we think of math, we

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SavvyPicks: Best Counting Books

February 03, 2009

Who says math has to be separate from reading? Since our own SAT days at the latest, we've divorced the two. Worse yet, we've often fallen into the trap of thinking that skills in one area preclude or at least differ fundamentally from skills in the other. It seems to us that preschool is the perfect time to reunite math and reading. We'd

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Why and How to Teach Preschoolers (Pre-) Math?

February 04, 2009

Babies are born with mathematical minds. Remember your toddler's early cries of "more, more, more!"? And take notice of your preschooler's eagle eye for who got how many cookies. There's the proof. So just as we do all we can to take advantage of our kids' natural language abilities from an early age, it is wise to pay some attention to their

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More Than Numbers: Toys to Introduce Matching, Patterns and Sequences

February 05, 2009

There's more to math than 1, 2, 3, and thank goodness because all of the other stuff is what makes it really fun for the little ones. Many of the simple, brilliant toys that best absorb children's attention are the very ones that fire up their mathematical engines. Here are a few gems we highly recommend! Matching Colors and Textures Puzzles by

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Wise Words from Shel Silverstein About Reasons to Count

February 06, 2009

Shel Silverstein gives ice-cream loving kids a tragi-comic reason to learn to count to eighteen. Eighteen Flavors Eighteen luscious, scrumptious flavors-- Chocolate, lime and cherry, Coffee, pumpkin, fudge-banana, Caramel cream and boysenberry, Rocky road and toasted almond, Butterscotch, vanilla dip, Butter-brickle, apple ripple,

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