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Help teaching junior infants-subtraction?

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  • 21-04-2016 12:26am
    #1
    zeebre12
    Registered Users Posts: 537 ✭✭✭


    I'm subbing in for a Junior Infant teacher and she wants me to introduce subtraction to the junior infants.How would you introduce it to them? I know its very basic 0-5 but what would you do the first couple of lessons? There seems to nothing about subtraction for junior infants in the book? Can anyone help or have any good websites?


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    #2
    Redser87
    Registered Users Posts: 610 ✭✭✭Redser87


    It seems basic to us as adults but it is a new concept for them so don't go to books or websites until you have used concrete resources. Use five-frames and counters, cubes, bears etc. Get them to physically put down five, then take away one and count what's left. Get a number of children to the top of the room, count them and get one to sit down - how many are left? The school may have standard language of maths so check that first.


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    #3
    silverharp
    Registered Users Posts: 17,873 ✭✭✭✭silverharp


    Im not a teacher but I taught my kids all this stuff before they went to school. I just kept it to concrete examples like having "5 smarties" and you give 2 away , how many do you have left? that kind of stuff. Objectively based on experience what I think is important is repetition and speed, get them to the point where just recall the answer instead of them working it out on their fingers and the like. Once they get the hang of it do some speed rounds and make a game of it

    there are also loads of tablet apps and website games to reinforce these kind of things, you could give them "homework" to check them out or let them take turns in the class if you have a class computer.

    A belief in gender identity involves a level of faith as there is nothing tangible to prove its existence which, as something divorced from the physical body, is similar to the idea of a soul. - Colette Colfer



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    #4
    Judge Trudy
    Closed Accounts Posts: 137 ✭✭Judge Trudy


    In Junior Infants, it would be more informal subtraction. You don't introduce the take away sign in Junior Infants, unless the curriculum has changed since I taught JIs. I would teach subtraction informally through the concept of bigger/smaller set, more than/less than, bigger number/ smaller number. If you have an interactive whiteboard, show lots of examples of bigger and smaller set of different objects. For example, a set of three cars and a set of five cars. Which set has more/ less? By how many? What is the difference between 3 and 5? etc. Give the pupils a laminated page with two large circles to make two sets, give them lots of compare bears to make sets of 3/1, 4/2, 5/1 sets of bears and talk about that. You need to stress to the children the vocabulary of maths and subtraction too.

    Also, there are lots of count back songs that you can integrate with music such as 5 little ducks/ 5 little monkeys/ 5 little speckled frogs/ 5 fat sausages etc. When I used to teach JIs, everyone in the class had a pan and 5 sausages which I printed and laminated from Sparklebox. This can be done with any song.


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    #5
    byhookorbycrook
    Moderators, Education Moderators, Regional South East Moderators Posts: 12,487 Mod ✭✭✭✭byhookorbycrook


    Subtraction is not on the curriculum for junior infants, which is why it isn't in the text books.


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