I am looking for some ideas. I am having trouble helping my daughter. She has nearly taught herself to read. She builds structures with her toys that include working parts like pulleys, levers, etc. She has been making symmetrical patterns in the shapes of birds out of little knick knacks and things she finds around our house since she was 2. Her drawing ability probably comes close to a fourth grader while she is 4 1/2. While she paints she actually studies what she is painting and attempts to make it true to form. People think she has taken ballet lessons but she actually taught herself from watching a video when she was 2. The list goes on and on.......but she cannot remember her numbers from 6-19. She knows 1-5 and understands the patterns from 20 up. I have tried everything from workbooks to flashcards to having her draw and decorate the numbers....but she doesn't retain it. At first I thought she was bored with them so I continued to try to keep her focused. But now I have realized that she is actually trying and I have stopped showing her the numbers because it seemed to be affecting her confidence in her other skills. I don't want to push her or make her feel uncomfortable. The problem is that the education in my area is lacking in public schools. She has the opportunity to be accepted into a couple of magnet schools for the gifted. Her father and I are both gifted and I think that is why we have recognized her ability to teach herself and her need to constantly learn and explore. That is all she wants to do. She creates and nothing else. She doesn't play with barbies or Mr. Potatoe heads....all she does is ask why and try new things and she gets soooo excited when she discovers something new and she can show us. But the magnet schools are tricky. One tests cognitive ability only so I feel she did well on the assessment. The other however requires the applicants to recognize their abc's and numbers up to 20. She knows the letters Upper and Lower case. She taught herself how to write and she knows all of their sounds and can put them together to sound out words....she is just a small step away from reading on her own. But the number thing is just odd....she can remeber the most minute details and recall people she met when she was very young...but the numbers just don't click. I don't want to cram something done her throat if she is not capable of understanding it at this point.....but I also don't want her to be bored and struggle in the same school system that her father and I participated in. My mother is dyslexic and had a lot of trouble with math in school. She can hardly read a book. I can't tell if my daughter is having some sort of mental trouble recognizing the numbers or if she is so disinterested that she just can't focus on the number. I really don't want to seem like a crazy parent trying to push their child into something they can't handle. I am far from that. I have given her room to explore everything she knows and I honestly feel that is the best thing for the gifted. But I also want her love for knowledge and investigation to continue. I want her to have the opportunity to fit in with others who think like her. I was wondering if anyone had any experience like this and any advice. I don't know if this is a common thing among the gifted or if she has some sort of disability or if she just hates numbers:)I don't remeber learning my numbers but I do remember first grade math and all the math after....i never saw the numbers. I saw the problem as a whole and could put it together in my head all the way into college algebra. So I don't know how to relate to her struggle. I tought I would try to teach her addition instead and maybe that would more interesting for her. No matter what it is I would like to find a way to make it interesting for her and to help her see them in a way that will help her grasp the concept. I don't care too much about her getting into the school that requires the alphabet and numbers....i think anyone can drill their child enough to learn those. But if she gets into the school that tested her cognitive ability I don't want her to fall too far behind in math. If anyone has any ideas of how to give her a better experience with numbers or any ideas about what might be going on I would appreciate it.
