Mesa Verde

Education Matters: Teachable Moments

Sep 08, 2004

By: Michael Southworth, M.Ed Verde Knoll Resident

What is a teachable moment? It?’s the time when a parent or guardian sees an opportunity to teach a life skill or lesson. These times can be planned or at the spur of the moment. Teachable moments can be very powerful! Some Children have a hard time connecting classroom skills to life skills. A teachable moment gives a child the opportunity to use skills learned in the classroom in a ?“real world?” situation.

There are teachable moments that happen all throughout the day. The teachable moments that I?’m going to suggests are moments that are planned. The more creative you can be with these ideas the more your children will like these moments.

Cooking
Fractions can be hard for some children to grasp. One of the best ways to teach fractions at home can be through cooking and baking. A great way to get your children in the kitchen is to ask them to help you bake cookies or cake. Have the children read the recipe and do the measuring of the ingredients. For more complexity ask questions like, ?“how many fourths are in ?¾ of a cup??” or ?“how many fourths make 1 cup??” You?’ll be surprised how many learning moments there can be in cooking as well as the quality family time you?’ll spend together cooking, eating, and laughing.

Washing
This activity can be for the small children that are learning their numbers and colors. Take a basket of clean clothes, after they have been washed and ask for some help. When folding the clothes ask you little one to ?“hand you 3 socks.?” For a little more thinking ask for 2 blue socks and 3 white socks. You can even get creative and ask them to pick up the socks with their right or left hand. The folding my not be the neatest or the quickest, but have taught you child some valuable skills that will excel them through the lower grades.

Shopping
Money is a hard concept to teach, but as you know children LOVE money. Shopping is a great way to teach money. My suggestion is to buy a play set of money from an educational supply store for these lessons. Real money can be very dirty. For the small children name recognition is the first thing they need to learn. A good strategy would be to have a few coins lying around the house. Throughout the day pick up a coin and ask them for the name of the coin. Once you think they have this concept teach the numerical value. For example, when they say the name, ask how much it?’s worth.

For the elementary children let them take their play money to the store and count out coins for the price of some products. Once they have this concept learned, hand them two products and ask them the total cost. Another idea is to ask them to take a calculator and keep track of the money you are spending.

For the high school and middle school kids ask them to compare products. For example, when buying Salsa one may be cheaper but you get more value for the money on the more expensive one because it has more salsa. They need to learn that price is not everything. They need to be critical shoppers. The key is value for money. Sometimes adults get tricked. Marketing companies work really hard to trick consumers to buy their product. If things are on sale for 10%, ask how much money they are saving. When out at a restaurant have the children help you work out the tip.

These are small things that will help your children become better at real life mathematics. With a little creativity and effort these teachable moments will last a lifetime. If you have any comments or questions, feel free to email me at southworth11@yahoo.com.