Skip Counting

As you can tell from the inactivity on my blog, we've not been doing much lately. Its the combination of school holidays, new school, change of routine and more so, lack of inspiration & strength from this mama.

However, not wanting Sonshine to loose his interest in learning, i try to give spontaneous lessons here and there without using any materials.

One such lesson that we've been doing is skip counting. I didn't realise this would be such a difficult topic to teach. Previously, N could easily remember & count in 2s, 5s & 10s because we read books on these topics. However, i was concern that he was merely memorising and not aware of the concept. I wanted him to know that to skip count in say 2s, meant that we add in 2s. Hence, when he was learning to count in 3s, 4s, i tried to take another approach. That's when i realised it was such a difficult task!

This time, i had him add in 3s, 4s mentally without any visual aid. I've to stop here and say that he seem to regress and have been using his fingers to add at times. But i am not too bothered, i am satisfied that he knows how to add.

Anyway, it took him a LONG while to remember the 3 & 4 times table. Actually, when i ask him to recite, he is still adding in his head but at a quicker pace. That said, this is what i want, i prefer him to be adding than to recite by memory and not knowing the concept. So, now, i can surely say he now knows to skip count (and understand the theory behind it) in 2s, 3s, 4s, 5s, 10s, 20s, 100s, 50s.  However, my problem now is how to get him learn the 6 times table and beyond? Looks like i have to get him to memorize from here on?