Singapore Math and Writing Numbers as Words

[chepyl]

I have my 5 almost 6 year old in Singapore 2A. Right now, it has a lot of exercises on writing the numbers as words. He is an excellent speller, but he hates to write. We do the minimal amount of writing as possible in his school work. He does much better when we talk through things. I know that learning to write the numbers as words in an important skill to learn, but is it covered again in later books? I know I can always throw it in later in handwriting worksheets or copy work, but I don't want to forget! I am leaning towards skipping at least some of the problems on each page. The page for today had him writing 11 three digit numbers as works. It was a fight to get through 6.

 

What would you do? :confused:

[TXBeth]

I would just do some of the exercises as practice reading the numbers as words. In other words, make sure when he sees 237 he knows to say "two hundred thirty-seven." Then skip the rest. He will learn it later in spelling or just pick it up as he gets older.

[Crimson Wife]

The skill gets reviewed over and over again if you use the Standards edition. My DD groaned when she saw in 5A that she had to write them up to the billions. I made her write out one and then just do the rest orally.

[BinahYeteirah]

I agree. The Standards HIG mentions that these exercises shouldn't be turned into a spelling lesson. I take that to mean that while it is important the child knows how to express a number written in digits using the correct number words, the writing and spelling are secondary. Doing some of the exercises orally accomplishes the same goal.

[boscopup]

We had the same issue with Math Mammoth. DS was a reluctant writer and not ready to do number words (not to mention that the space to write "twenty-three" was big enough to type "twenty-three" :lol:). I had him do a few, with me writing the list of number words to refer to for spelling, and he just had to demonstrate that he could write them with the hyphen and all that. Not a big deal. Just do a few and move on. It will be hit upon again every year, and you'll probably do number words in spelling as well.

[chepyl]

Thanks, that's what I assumed. That is the only part of school that I ever hear whining about...writing, especially numbers! He wrote his dictation lesson with no fuss, write the numbers....I think it bores him. He wants to do the real math!

[nov05mama]

The skill gets reviewed over and over again if you use the Standards edition. My DD groaned when she saw in 5A that she had to write them up to the billions. I made her write out one and then just do the rest orally.

 

This is what I have my almost 6 year old do as well. We are finishing up 1B and are about to start 2A by the end of the month and it's the main frustration around here ;) He is a pro at math, but hates having to write so much FOR math, so I minimize it where I can, just making sure he knows the answers.

[Mallory]

We do sometimes just do them orally.

 

But I have found that old blank checks make those problems go much faster ;)

Edited August 8, 2011 by Mallory

[chepyl]

We do sometimes just do them orally.

 

But I have found that old blank checks make those problems go much faster ;)

 

That is a great idea! It teaches them why they need to know how to write them as they practice!! I might grab an old book from a closed account for tomorrow!

 

But...how do you do them orally?? Just say the number out loud? Do you make them say the hyphens?

[Dmmetler]

I let my DD write them with letter tiles :).

[nansk]

Either you can scribe for the student, or give them word tiles that say "five", "hundred", "twenty", "three" to put in the right sequence.

[Alice]

I have totally skipped all those sections. I figured at some point I'll do one lesson on the concept and just be done. My son is going into third grade and also used to absolutely hate anything with writing. He's a bit better about it now so maybe we'll cover it this year or maybe not. I don't feel like it's essential at this age.

[Holly]

We've done a few different things in writing type situations:

--go over it orally, I think the most important thing for now is that they can read the words

--break up the page so it isn't as much writing at once...maybe do a few of the problems at the beginning of the math lesson for the next few days. I do this with those really long Singapore reviews or my DD will be in tears.

--Skip for now and go back at the end of the book. My DC's skills can change dramatically in just a few months. You'd probably still want to go over it orally for now though.

[Crimson Wife]

But...how do you do them orally?? Just say the number out loud? Do you make them say the hyphens?

 

With a younger student, I probably would have him/her say "hyphen" and "comma" where appropriate. But with my almost-9 y.o., I could see from the one problem she wrote that she knows where those go, so I just had her say the words.

 

She got a kick out of my telling her about my own 4th grade teacher, who was very particular about not throwing in an extraneous "and" in numbers (e.g. reading 102 as "one hundred two" rather than "one hundred and two"). Mrs. H____ would go ballistic every time someone said an extra "and". :lol:

[BinahYeteirah]

She got a kick out of my telling her about my own 4th grade teacher, who was very particular about not throwing in an extraneous "and" in numbers (e.g. reading 102 as "one hundred two" rather than "one hundred and two"). Mrs. H____ would go ballistic every time someone said an extra "and". :lol:

 

Interesting that you bring this up. I believe that I was taught to say and write number words with the "and". It was an adjustment for me to say the numbers as instructed by Singapore. I thought it was a simple difference in style or something that had changed since my generation was in school. :confused:

[chepyl]

Today we did a section of the IP book and it had 6 or 8 write the numbers in words, and another 6 or 8 read the words and write the numbers. I only had him write 1000. There was much less fuss about math. We even set the timer to see how fast he could get through the pages! Although, he asked me what came after TH and I said sound it out...what makes the "o - u" sound oops...meant to say the "ow" sound, he laughed and finished writing the word!