Numbers

Christopher LOVES numbers. He loves counting, adding, subtracting, and more. If he can make it be about numbers, he often will. There have been times when I've asked him to read me something, and he counts the letters instead! He just loves numbers.

Last week we went to Phoenix to visit his cousins. While at their house, he found an abacus. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abacus) I didn't realize he had it until he brought it to me and said, "Mom, this has one hundred beads on it."
"Oh really Christopher? Did you count them all?"
"No. This row has ten, and all the rows have the same number, and there are ten rows. So it has one hundred."

Ooooookay! That was definitely multiplication, and certainly beyond what I was expecting out of him! But it didn't stop there. He set it on the floor, sat down beside it, and started moving beads over. He moved three beads from every row. Then he pointed to the side with seven beads left and said, "Now that is seventy. There are seven here, and there are ten rows, so that is seventy." I just shook my head in amazement.

Now, that said, I did know he could do basic multiplication. A while ago he was playing, and he had three groups of three. "I've got nine. Three sets of three is nine." Sets of small number he can sum up very quickly without counting them individually, so I suppose I should have known that the big numbers (on an abacus nonetheless) were on their way.

About two weeks ago I realized that he was using estimates when he was counting. He was playing Monopoly Junior on the computer, and a few rounds in he stopped counting his move each time he rolled and started just clicking. When he would make a mistake, instead of counting it out, he'd glance from his current square to where he thought he should be again. Occasionally he would have to stop and count it out, then he would start estimating his distance again the next round. I asked him if he was estimating, and he asked what that was. I said, "It's where you guess what to do based on what you know. Like you would guess how far to go because you know about how many squares it is." "Oh, yeah. See mom? It's ten squares on this side, and five in the middle here." Yup, he's definitely got it figured out, and was estimating.

Then yesterday I was washing his hair in the bath, and he hates baths and getting his head wet. So he tilts his head back, squeezes his eyes closed tight, and as I pour the water over his head he says, "Twenty." (I pour another cup of water on his head.) "Fourty." (Another cup.) "Sixty." I stop.
"Christopher, what are you doing?"
"I'm getting points. Every time I hold still for the water I get twenty points. When I get a hundred, I win the game."

My kid is counting by twenties. I knew he could count by tens, but twenties? I rubbed the soap into his hair, then it was time to wash it out.

"Thirty. Sixty. Ninety."
"Christopher, are you counting by thirty?"
"Yeah, on this level I have to reach two hundred, and if I count by thirty I'll get there faster."

Yeah.....