I knew you'd understand me. I have given up for today on explaining one minus one or two minus two to my son. He is stuck on one minuse one is two and two minues two is four. He's got addition facts down up to 10s but now I started doing some subtraction facts and he is so not for the change. I am so glad I only have one stubborn child to learn and another one next year for K. I'd go crazy with a whole classroom.
My now 5yo was like that for a while, then I started showing him with gummy bears...I put two of them on the table in front of him...then I asked how many he'd have if I ate two...he still didn't get it...until I took the gummies and ate them...then get understood subtraction. He also decided that day he much preferred addition. what kid wouldn't. And so you all don't think I"m a mean mommy I did give him some gummies to eat after he understood what minus was.
I was going to sugest using M & M's to show but gummies would work too! I would play a game with my son, starting with 10 candies. I would then tell him to subtract a number from the group. He would make sure he would get the number subtracted out right because....if he got the problem right, he could eat the group of candy that had the most in it. HTH
I explained it to my child as if subtraction is throwing something away. I said if you have 3 cupcakes and you throw one away, how many do have left? She understood the concept then of "subtraction" being to get rid of or to lose something. She just wasn't understanding what it meant.
You already got some good suggestions for teaching subtraction. Also, what I found really helpful when it comes to teaching math to children younger than 7 is to not mix addition and subtraction questions. It gets confusing for the kindergartners because most of them still did not get to the stage where they understand reversibility concept. Hope this helps, Helena at ReadingIsFun.me
I agree with Helena. He may not be ready yet for the more abstract math. Keep it with counters, rather than numbers. Another great way is to make 3x5 Dominos cards. You know those little round stickers you can buy at any teacher store? The ones that come with about a million <G> per pack? Fold a 3x5 card in half, and make Dominos. So one side of the Domino has 1, the other side has two. How many are there? Three. Now fold down half. How many did we take away? How many are left? The Gummies and M&M's work well. Put down a certain number, 5, and then cover two with a cup. Uncover, cover one with a cup. Uncover, cover three with the cup. Keep doing this over and over.
no teacher store for me but there is tons of candy at the mini mart. I can get my 5 or 6 year old to do math all day if I use candy.
I have no words of wisdom and I wish you well. My daughter took nearly a year to understand the concept of subtraction. She had other math concepts down in advance like telling time, counting money, addition, and even started on multiplication on her own, but she just had a strange aversion to taking anything away. We used manipulatives and she could get the right answer, but she did not really get the concept and could not apply it; then one day she just "got" it...thankfully.
That's my 7yo Ds, minus the getting it part! You're not alone. We're struggling with subtraction here, even though he gets fractions just fine. (Go figure??? )
Oh, thank you! I forgot all about fractions! She was getting that too, but then she has been taking piano/music, learning quarter, half and whole notes, since she had just turned 4yo so I thought that was part of the reason. I used to tutor math so I have several ideas in how to present ways to think it out, but my own daughter has been the most challenging and now that she is older, I know why: she does math in her head like her father. She just gets the answer, but she cannot explain how she gets it and struggles with writing equations. She is a highly abstract thinker with math, so I have worked more on mental math techniques. Back to introducing subtraction, I tried making every subtraction equation into an addition. So instead of 5-2=? it would be 2+?=5 and she could do that without blinking an eye, but as soon as she would see that minus sign again, the connection that both had the same answer was broken. All I can say is when the child is ready to get it the child will get it. For my daughter, a people person, her light bulb moment was when I made each equation into a story problem with people. For instance, I would say if you have five pieces of candy and gave one each to three of your friends how many would you have left. TWO! Great so 5-3=? (Blink, blink) The "5" is the pieces of candy and the "3" is how many you gave away to each to of your friends, so how many do you have left? Two! And that is the answer you should write down now. Oh! After a week or two, she began talking her way through each equation making it a story problem with people. Then she eventually could just do subtraction. Until we got to subtracting double digits...but that is another story.
Actually, Belle, it works with both subtraction and addition. And you can hold it so it is tall (demonstrating vertical addition/subtraction) or wide (demonstrating horizontal). You can use them to show how the "fact families" are connected....5+3=8 (put the five on the top) and 3+5=8 (putting the three on the top) and the subtracting facts to go with it by folding back either the five or the three. But that's long-term, and not something you'd do right now with her. I got that out of a book for kids with learning disabilities when I was in the classroom.
Like Seeking, with her daughter, addition he gets fine, it's subtraction we really struggle with, but cause he's so visual the ability to bend the cards over is what really grabbed me. I love books about learning disabilities. (Though I wish the labels weren't there. Disability suggests not being able to learn, and that's simply not the case with the majority of kids, they just aren't necessarily as left brained as the current system being taught is. ) we're using cuisenaire rods for fact families. He gets that. It's just that silly minus symbol. Although Seeking just gave me an idea. My son is also musically inclined, (he picks up his piano pieces very quickly) so perhaps if I explain the minus sign is like a silent note? In 4/4 time we have four beats but if 1 is silent how many do we play? 3. So 4-1 =3. He MIGHT get that! Thank you ladies for letting me talk out loud! :lol:
