I had that same professor. He rode a motorcycle. Wore his hair in a long gray ponytail and threw a keg party disguised as a project. He didn't bother coming to class and there was no text, but we still had tests. ???

I honestly don't know and can't argue that point. My psych knowledge is limited to Intro to Psychology (I think I mentioned that) and was mostly facetious.

You have obviously met my youngest child!

:) No, maybe not PC, but we "potty train" puppies and children, so is it really any different? I'm surprised you didn't mention that skinner did his studies on rats. Eeek. ;) In all honesty, we attended a montessori co-op last year and there was a reward basket that the children could pick a prize from when they completed certain work. It came to the point where my daughter and her friend would ask, "What work can I do for a prize?" There was lots of valuable work to be done, but their focus was only on the end prize. I think if I were to offer prizes, I wouldn't do it in a predictable way, but just pull out a prize every now and then and say, "I really appreciate your hard work." It's a surprise prize. I wouldn't want to get to the point where my daughter said to me, "what will you give me if I finish this math?"

I'm flashing back to psych 101 in college. How about Skinner's behavioral modification method. Offer rewards (like marshmallows, or just "Wow, I can see you are really working hard on that!" at frequent intervals. Over time the rewards come less frequently and at unpredictable intervals, but the subject (in this case your daughter) continues the good behavior in anticipation of the reward. http://psych.answers.com/research-methods/interval-training-the-best-method-of-research Our daughters psychologist recommended something similar for modifying my daughters behavior (we hit a really really rough patch, oppositional defiant disorder) and we essentially ignored bad behavior and really really praised good behavior. Over time, her good behavior really increased even though we praised her less and less. Think of it as your own course in behavioral psychology.

A job well done is its own motivation? Hard work is its own reward? Ok, but seriously. In general, I don't offer rewards. Working hard to finish your work means you've finished your work and you are free to do whatever it is you would rather be doing. I guess I'm just mean.

And I'm weird, so I'll contribute this too. Preterm infant hippocampal volumes correlate with later working memory deficits http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18799516 My oldest daughter was preterm and has working memory deficits (seen during psychoeducational testing). Possibly her working memory deficits are related to low hippocampal volumes. And low hippocampal volumes correlate with difficulty in rote learning facts. Anyway, it's fun to speculate on what makes us who we are. Thanks for posting this.

I think this is very true. I sometimes wish I were neurotypical, but then... What would be the fun in that?

As someone with two completely different kids... I'm watching my first grader absorb math facts effortlessly. My fourth grader is now learning her multiplication facts, again (3rd year in a row). We don't all have the same aptitudes for math facts. I find the research fascinating. And thanks to everyone's recommendations, I continue to drill facts with my oldest but I let her use a chart for her work. She may never be a famous mathematician, but she outpaces her peers conceptually in math. I made it through college level calculus and I was much like her. I still managed to work as a chemist. I bet she'll be just fine in the long run.

At our house the bucket is more like a sieve. Helpful, right? We've tried AAS and Logic of English. Sequential Spelling, and I just ordered Apples and Pears. AAS my daugter hated. Logic of English was just so much to keep up with and with my daughters inability to memorize and short working memory, remembering a rule and then holding in her mind long enough to use it to spell a word? Ha! Anyway. We've seen lots of progress with Sequential Spelling and I ordered Apples and Pears because my daughter seemed interested watching her little sister do it. My youngest started on Lesson 1. My 4th grader tested in at Lesson 31. Not very far ahead considering how much time I've spent (wasted) on spelling. AARRGGHH. Oh well. We'll just keep plugging away at it. Slow and steady wins the race, right?

This looks very interesting. Let me know what you think after you've had a chance to look it over. I feel like I have tried everything for fact memorization. I'm really starting to think they just can't stick. I know she's as frustrated with her inability to remember them as I am. It's certainly not purposeful.

I don't think it's dyslexia. She's was an early reader and is still advanced for her age. She has very good comprehension. I have thought about using a timer. I would use it just to give her a sense of time passing, I think she might find it helpful that way. I like your idea about having him track where his time went. She does have an assignment sheet, and while she likes being able to check things off as she does them, I sometimes wonder if she finds the list overwhelming, even though a lot of the tasks only take about 5 to 10 min of focused time. Focus is the problem though, right.

We started this morning with tea and cream (we had a poetry tea, so sweet) but now that you mention it, she was much more focused for math this morning. I'm sure it didn't hurt that I gave her a multiplication chart. She was cheerful and did her work in a reasonable amount of time. It was fabulous! It's nice to hear success stories. Sometimes I can't imagine where this journey is taking us. I hope it's leading her to college, she wants to be a chemist (like dad) and I just don't want math to be the sticking point. :( That would be sad. That said, I never took a chemistry class where I didn't have access to my handy dandy calculator. I guess she'll just wear the buttons out if she needs to.

I'm totally trying the dark chocolate. What a great idea!

We're a 4 iPad house. ;)

Cereal! Wine! Now I have a real plan! (Tonight it's merlot.)

I actually own this book and pulled it off the shelf for a reread today. Right now, I've got the book and a glass of wine. Dinner might not get made. ;)

Yes, she's 9. We have done this in the past and I agree this is a good idea(making the chart daily so you can use it). Currently she uses an app on my phone, QuickMath, for drill before we do "real" math. Last year before we closed up shop, she was finishing a round in just under 2 min. Yesterday, 11 min. It's just so disheartening to lose so much ground. Today she did the pretest on TimezAttack. She was pretty gloomy about the results. I tried to encourage her, "it's ok. It will come back." Tomorrow I think I'll offer her a choice of what kind of drill she wants to do and then let her use a chart for her work.

I'm not sure if I've ever posted here before. :) My daughter is accelerated in some areas, and not so much in others...hence the 2e. :) Because of that, I don't really feel I fit over here. Still, this question fits better here than on the regular forum, thought it might sort of fit on the learning challenges board too. I just feel like crying today, so I'm going to let it all out. Run fast if you need to, I totally understand. If you have a 2e child, or experience with one, I could really use some advice or just reassurance. It's only our 4th day of school this term, so I know some things will get better as we find our groove, but the things that are...problems?...are things we experienced last year too, only that as her workload and challenge level increases, so do our...issues? Last year we had testing done (WISC IV and WJ III) so we could figure out some of the quirks I saw in my daughters learning. It was expensive, as I'm sure some of you know, but worth every single penny and then some. I wanted to believe she wasn't TRYING to drive me crazy intentionally, but without some sort of proof, I was just getting more and more frustrated. DD9 started 1st grade in Singapore 1 and quickly worked through 2 and 3 that first year before Easter. When the first BA book came out we grabbed it right away, hoping for some challenge to really get her thinking. She was bored and increasingly frustrated by the monotony of Singapore math. BA was a breath of fresh air and saved her love of math. Here's my problem: Z scored in the 97% for Applied Problems and 82% for Quantitative Concepts. This is good, and pretty consistent with what I've seen at home. Her Math fluency, after 4 years of math fact practice (K-3) was...31%. Her overall processing speed is 27%. Even when she knows a math fact, it takes her a looooooonnnnnggggg time to retrieve it. So now she is in 4th grade and the work is getting harder. I'm not even sure she finds the work more difficult, but after the summer off, her math facts are gone again (we seem to learn them and forget them, learn them and forget them....) Math is taking forever and a day. Today she spent a half an hour doing three problems. The muttering I heard was, "I can't remember what 6X3 is!!!!" She never complained that the work was too hard or that she didn't understand. She even miscalculated 4+3 twice. So the teaching part of math took us about a half an hour and the 3 problems she finished in half an hour (one of which was wrong because of calculation error) = 1 hr of math. She's got other work to do. I don't want to have her working alllllllll day, but I do have a certain amount of work I need her to accomplish. I don't feel like I ask a lot because I know she grasps concepts quickly. It's skill areas where she really suffers and slows way down. Spelling, math and language mechanics are our biggest issues and math is arguable her best subject. I can't sit beside her all day and nag her along, I have another child to teach. Besides, nagging wouldn't help and would probably make her feel bad too. Did I mention that the psychologist said she saw some things that indicated ADHD inattentive type? OMG. I know this is a long description of our problem. Is there anyone else out there who is dealing with a 2e student and feels downtrodden or has some advice on what I can do to help this super sweet, sensitive little girl? Teresa

I love love love Jurassic park! That said, a lot of it is really violent and some of the violence is scary. Remember the little girl at the beginning of the book that gets attacked at the beach? That's really scary for kids I think. Violence to adults seems more detached, or maybe that's just me. I wouldn't let my nine year old read it.

This is a great idea, and it would help with the other things I need her to remember too.

We've done that too! ETA: How many times have I said, "What's the story for that? Mr. And Mrs. Snowman?"

That's how we learned them the first time! And the second... lol She loved that game. I should probably put it on our new computer. Thanks for the idea! Teresa

Vent alert! For the third year in a row we seem to be learning multiplication facts from scratch. Why can't I make these things stick? We started the summer with the best of intentions to do a little math each day to keep things fresh, but summer took on a life of its own. I'm just so frustrated. Math took her forever today (she's poky anyway, but sheesh). Now it's 1 PM and she still has a bunch of work to do. ARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHH. Anyone else in this boat? Teresa