After putting on your math lenses, look around the room and look for opportunities for “power-chats” incorporating math ideas. Not every verbal exchange about numbers is necessarily powerful, and a power-chat should raise the child’s level of thinking but should not be on a level that is too high. Here are a few general pointers on what power chats should be like.
| How-To for Power-Chats | Power-Connect Questions[1]
(to connect with the child’s thinking)
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| · Construct a math scenario/situation related to a child’s interests
· Don’t make it too easy or too difficult, but raise the thinking level whenever it seems appropriate.[2] · At some point (perhaps even at the onset of the chat), let the child take the lead. · Make errors occasionally and see if the child catches them. · Continue only if the child is having fun. |
· What do you suppose would happen if…?
· What will you do next? · I wonder… · How can we check to see how close your guess is? · Why do you think that? · How did you figure that out? · Do you have any ideas about how we might begin? |
[1] This list is adapted from Family Math for Young Children (Coates & Stenmark, 1997)
[2] This description summarizes the concept of one of Vygotsky’s Zones of Proximal Development.
powerstartmath.com 