2nd grade proficiency in addition
These are the flash cards I used with my child when he was in early elementary school.
Addition in Early Elementary School
Let’s go back and talk some more about second grade. It’s very important to lay the foundations for math, early, in a child’s life. In first grade, and in kindergarten, children are learning the basics of addition and some subtraction.
It’s not like you can learn these things in a year or two…it takes time. So that’s why children are still learning, in second grade, how to do addition and subtraction. But, by this time, you want to make sure your child is becoming very good at addition and is developing some proficiency.
So, really making sure your child knows the addition facts for answers up to 30 or lower is important. For instance, if your child is given the problem 19 + 1 or 15 + 3 or 20 + 10, you want to make sure he or she really knows the answer.
When my son was in 1st grade, we moved to a different state. In that new school their requirements around math were a little more stringent. He had to know his addition facts within about three seconds of being presented with a problem—one Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi. That’s how long he got to complete the problem so to speak.
He also had regular math sheets to do with about 30 or so problems on them. He had to complete in a certain amount of time (usually one-to-two minutes or so), which didn’t give him much time to think through 4 + 4, he couldn’t count on his hands and get the answers to enough problems in time—unless he really knew the answers he wouldn’t get through the sheet. I loved this. I could see how this would give him an advantage and needed skills when it came to math.
I tell everybody I can, and I share this with the kids I work with, learning addition facts, subtraction facts, multiplication facts, and division facts is crucial to a child’s success in math.
So, here are some things you can, if you haven’t already done some of them.
You can get flashcards with addition problems on them for your second grader and quiz him or her on their facts. Make it fun congratulate them and work on any problems they seem to be struggling with.
You can get worksheets with practice problems on them and let your child work through them.
You can write the numbers 1 - 19 on sheets of paper, then write a plus sign on a separate sheet paper and an equal sign on the other. Place one number on the left of the plus sign and another number on the right (make your own little equation on the table or on the floor.. See if your child can guess the answer. (You might want to write the answers on sheets of paper too, so that you can fill them into the equation when your child gets them right).
You can take a certain number of toys, and/or pennies or something, and group them into different groups…say 4 toys on one side and 4 toys on the other. Let your child tell you how many toys there are in total without counting them individually.
You can also let your child teach you with the toys, how to add the numbers…or with any of the exercise, quite frankly….teaching back something you are developing is a great way to learn.
Just try to be fun. Interactive. But, don’t let your child get through the second grade and not have a command of addition at its basic level.