Counting!

Adam can finally tell us without thinking too hard that he is 9 years old. For some reason the number nine has been a major mental block for him. The block crumbled today, however, and he has no problem with it all of a sudden. (Much rejoicing here!) He has to be the only 9-yr-old I've ever met that didn't know how old he was. When we met him he told us he was seven. He had been seven when they arrived in the orphanage and never "had a birthday" after that. So, he assumed he must have still been seven. (I might be wrong, it might have been 8 that he thought he was. I know I mentioned it in one of my Ukraine blogs). Anyway, now that he's speaking some English, the number 9 just has been a terribly hard number to say. Not that he can't pronounce it, he just couldn't look at a nine and say, "NINE." If we said, "Hey, Adam, draw me the number 9," he could do that, but to do it the other way, no way. Whenever we'd ask him what the 9 was, he'd say, "11" or "8" or whatever else was the first thing in his head. Well, anyway, today I got out the kitchen timer, (found it! It was missing for a while), set it for ten minutes, and then when it went off I asked him how old he was. Over and over and over again once every ten minutes for about an hour and a half. It worked. (It wasn't like I was hammering the kid. I just turned off the timer and said, "Hey, Adam, how old are you?" and then he'd answer me. If he got it wrong I'd just correct him and then reset the timer. Worked pretty slick; stressfree and kind of fun. He can do it without thinking now! He has also fully mastered his 13, 14, 15, 16. (That 13 was a killer since his "th's" often come out like "f's" making 13 into 14 and then messing him up to say 15 after 13.) I've talked to other Ukie adopters and a couple of them say their kids had trouble with that too.

I've been looking online for some dot-to-dots for the numbers 1-10 for Liana. She still has trouble with 7-10. Would you believe they are hard to find? I only found one site! They have some pretty awesome sites for dot-to-dots, but most have numbers 1-20+. Frustrating, especially since she LOVES those. She can count to thirty easy as pie, but she still needs work recognizing them.

I've been researching some math curriculums and found one that comes highly recommended by another homeschool mom I know, plus a lot of people on some of the homeschool yahoo groups. It is called Math U See and it has 3D manipulatives for their curriculum. Not all paper and pencil stuff. I guess the major thrust of it is that the kids really understand the "why's" of the math instead of just memorizing things "because." As much as I struggled with math myself, I think this might be the way to go with the kids. John still needs to check it out though first.

Oh, another major thing happened today. I broke down and put the kids' toys in their rooms. There were a few squabbles over whose toys were whose, but other than that, it went ok. I really need that cupboard for their school stuff. I've been dragging all their school stuff - crayons, pencils, books, workbooks, notebooks, etc., etc., from our bedroom to the kitchen every morning and that has gotten rather old. It's nice to have it all in one spot now. We'll just have to see how they do with the toys in their rooms and play it by ear. I also kept a few special toys and puzzles in the cupboard for Aleksa to play with especially while we're doing school. We really need to invest in some good puzzles (she loves puzzles!), and other educational toys for her. Someone told me to check Ebay. Hopefully we'll find some good deals. It really stinks that we came home from Ukraine so late in the "rummage sale" season. Educational toys can make you go bankrupt if you pay full price for them all! We'll see!