It has been a whole two months since I started my battle against a Senior Kindergarten boy’s lack of motivation to write. Although brilliantly advanced in mathematics, this little boy’s reluctance to write is actually hindering his performance in reading and writing in school.
As a result, I have been asking the question: “How do I get this math-loving child to write independently?
As discussed in Part 1 of this series, I gathered some tried-and-true tricks that worked with this particular child in this particular case.
Patterns
Math Fiction
“If you could choose…” Questions
Math Magic Tricks
From the previous post, I showed some examples of the first two strategies. In this post, I will discuss “If you could choose…” Questions and Math Magic Tricks.
“If you could choose…” Questions
Both the little boy and I love this activity. He finds it fun, and I find it fun and surprising to read all the ideas he has.
My question for him was:
“If you could be any shape, what shape would you be? Explain.”
The first thing he said to me was “does it have to be a 2D shape or can I choose a 3D shape?”. I told him that he could choose any shape he likes, two-dimensional or three-dimensional.
He said, “what about four dimensions?”
“What would that look like?” I asked.
He giggled and then decided to start writing. His writing response was:
“I like to be a cone because cone is like a ice cream cone which is my favorite treat.”
Another one of my favorites was:
“If you could grow strawberries into any shape you like, what shape would it be? Why?”
I asked him this after showing him cube-shaped watermelons.
Having some trouble deciding, I let him look through our collection of 3D solids.
He looked and marveled at cubes, prisms, pyramids. He asked me about the difference between cylinders and spheres. Intrigued, he ended up picking the half-cylinder.
“It will be a half-cylinder because it does all the same thing as the cylinder. It rolls it also stacks.”
He then told me that because it rolls like a cylinder, the strawberry would be more fun to eat.
Math Magic Tricks
Last but not least, I used some math magic tricks to stimulate curiosity, encourage some algebraic thinking, and inspire writing.
Try this:
Pick a number, keep it secret
Multiply it by 2
Add 1
Add 1 again
Divide by 2
Subtract 1
Tell me your number
The number you got at the end is the same as the number you pick, and it could be easily proven using some simple algebra. So, once you tell me your number, I would say that I could guess your secret number because I know magic!
This, of course, to an SK child, was beyond magical. And what do you do when you learned a magic trick and how it works? You can’t wait to test it on somebody.
The next task, the child was asked to test it on his family members and his friends.
The grand finale was the writing prompt:
“How do you think this magic trick works?”
You can add to such an open-ended question by putting in supports such as:
What is the opposite operation of multiplying by 2?
After multiplying any number by 2, is the result an even or odd number?
What happens to a number if you add 1 to it twice?
The above question help build some algebraic thinking without relying on the knowledge of algebraic symbols and rules.
The child presented in this two-part series is probably not the only one who likes mathematics and problem solving, but hates to communicate his logical reasoning through written work. Hopefully the four strategies discussed here will inspire teachers and parents to encourage these little learners with big minds to write and share their big ideas.
Written by Mandy Lam
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