Introduction
Early math skills have the greatest predictive power to later success, followed by reading and then attention skills, (Greg J. Duncan)Â The more math-oriented activities children do in the early years, the better they’ll understand math in primary and secondary school.
Unfortunately, the most common approach to teaching early math skills has been to surround children with numbers alongside their letters and encourage them to practice counting just as they practice singing the alphabet. But researchers say that this approach may not be entirely correct. Learning to count by rote teaches children number words and order, but it does not teach them number sense (which is just 1 strand on Math), any more than singing the letters A-B-C-D-E-F-G in the alphabet song teaches phonemic awareness and reading.
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Bongiswa Kotta RamushwanaBongiswa Kotta- Ramushwana is from Eastern Cape she started her career in Storytelling at Zanendaba Storytelling Company in Johannesburg. She has participated in different platforms nationally and internationally, performed in schools, libraries, orphanages and attended different storytelling festivals around the world in. In 2020 she launched her brain child Storytelling Festival called KingNdaba. The festival was aimed at preschools and it was a success. Her passion is driven by the love of telling stories and she enjoys the company of her audience especially children, where she dances and sings with them. In India she has held several workshops in and performed at Vizag Junior Literature Festival, Bookaroo Festival, Udaipur Tales, Kathai Kalatta Under the Alamaram International Storytelling Festivals. She serves in the board for Mogale Development Arts Company and Kindom Kids committee since 2016. Currently Bongiswa is working at Freedom Park Heritage Site in Pretoria as a professional Storyteller.
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Catherine Burckett -St LaurentCatherine Burckett -St Laurent is an American from Cincinnati, Ohio. She has a Bachelor of Early Years Education from the University of Cincinnati and a Master of Early Years Education from Cameron University. Over the last 25 years, she has been a teacher, trainer, manager, adjunct professor and has worked and lived in many different countries. Currently she is an educational consultant and runs her own business called Bee Creative Lab. She has been multiple municipal schools of Reggio Emilia , Italy several time and their methods and creativity with children really inspired her ! This experience made her very passionate about creativity and she loves helping children express themselves in many different. She is excited to share this knowledge with you!
Chrysaellect