How important are visual representations of coins?

[Dmmetler]

My DD does fine counting real money. She does fine adding amounts of money using decimals. But when it comes to pictures of coins, especially if the size isn't the same as real coins, she gets VERY frustrated over figuring out which is the nickel, dime, and quarter.

 

Is this a skill to sit on (frustrating her to no end, because, darn it, she can DO the math-it's just figuring out which picture is which that drives her crazy), or one of those things that isn't a hill to die on and she either doesn't need it, or will figure it out as she gets older?

[RachelFlores]

I wouldn't worry about it at all. If she knows the actual money and can add it together, that's the whole point of the pictures anyway. I'd give her the actual coins for each worksheet problem and have her do it that way.

 

Her problem might be that she is recognizing the sizes and not the pictures, but with all the new series of pictures on coins (quarters, nickles, pennies all have different pictures on the face side now), it is probably better to learn the sizes than the pictures anyway.

[Dinsfamily]

My DD does fine counting real money. She does fine adding amounts of money using decimals. But when it comes to pictures of coins, especially if the size isn't the same as real coins, she gets VERY frustrated over figuring out which is the nickel, dime, and quarter.

 

Is this a skill to sit on (frustrating her to no end, because, darn it, she can DO the math-it's just figuring out which picture is which that drives her crazy), or one of those things that isn't a hill to die on and she either doesn't need it, or will figure it out as she gets older?

 

My ds is similar. He doesn't have any problem doing the math but the pics trip him up. We've been focusing on learning the different pictures on each coin but I'm not too worried about it. We supplement Singpore with Horizons and he does fine with the $$ pics in that since the pics look more realistic. For now, he just asks me which coin is in the picture if he has a question.

[MerryAtHope]

Books only use pictures because they can't give all our kids real money to count, LOL! I'd either give her real money to do those pages, or write the denomination by each type of coin ahead of time so she can do them.

 

You could show her some identifying features of the coins so she can match her real coins with the pictures a little easier--she may not be looking at what's on the coin so much as feeling/seeing the size, shape, ridges, color--so maybe helping her to know the pictures on the real coins & how they match up with pictured coins would help her. (Though, I know these can vary a lot with the new coins out now!).

 

The goal is for her to know how to count money, give or get correct change, etc... If she knows those skills, you can even skip pages in her math book. Adult life has never required me to be able to do math with pictures of money :). Well, except when teaching my kids from their math book...

 

Merry :-)

[boscopup]

The only time I think it could be an issue would be if you are required to do standardized testing, and even then, it's probably not a large enough portion of the test to make *that* much of a difference (though I haven't seen a standardized test since I last took one :D ).

 

Could you give her one of each type of coin to refer to when looking at the pictures in her book? Then she could compare them to the real thing and figure them out. Some books make the coins so similar in size that it really is hard to tell which is which!

[mo2]

I use real money and ignore the pictures. How many times in your life have you had to count money in a picture? None, I bet. (At least not since you passed the 2nd grade!)

[stripe]

I think all these new coins make it hard, too. I say, use real coin play instead.