"Howden (1989) described number sense as a "good intuition about numbers and their relationships. It develops gradually as a result of exploring numbers, visualizing them in a variety of contexts, and relating them in ways that are not limited by traditional algorithms" (p.11)." Many adults might have a misconception about what number sense means. An example that Dr Yeap gave in class was if a child is told to write the number 51 but he writes 15. Most adults might think that he is weak in his number sense. However we should not be judging from just one point of view. Give the child the ten base blocks and ask him to show what 51 is. He is able to pick out 5 ten base blocks and 1 one base block. It means that it is his conventions that is wrong, not that he is weak in his number sense.
Dr Yeap had also introduced nice music videos related to fairy tales. Do check out the youtube for more videos, as the songs are really nicely sang. So for the problem related to the three little pigs was that the three little pigs had a celebration after the wolf did not successfully blow their house down. They bought 4 pizzas home and wanted to share equally amongst themselves.
One thing that Dr Yeap always made us do in class was to think of more than one methods to solve the problem. Instead of giving us a standard solution to the problem, he will listen to the solutions that we come up with and the whole class will discuss if the solution is workable. That is something which I think teachers should be encouraged to do in class.
Lastly, to end up today's post with one good quote from Dr Yeap! (:
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