Breakfast cardiovascular workout.

[rivka]

Heart-pounding exercise #1: lifting UP. Alex still eats baby oatmeal for breakfast, the kind where you measure out spoonfuls of dry cereal and mix them with an equal quantity of milk. It used to be five tablespoons; now that her interest in oatmeal is beginning to wane, it's four.

I always count the spoonfuls of cereal out loud as they go into the bowl. When I went down to four spoonfuls (several weeks ago) and started stopping the count at four, Alex started saying "five!" at the end. I thought it was cute. I also thought, "Hee! If I were one of those crazy mothers, I would run and tell everyone 'my baby can count!' But obviously, she's memorized the word I used to say at the end of oatmeal measuring."

This morning, I measured out four spoonfuls of oatmeal, counting them. Alex added, "five!"

"That's right," I said cheerfully. "Five is the next number."

And Alex said, "six!"

Holy shit.

Hey, everyone! My baby can count!My baby has begun to recognize that number words occur in a particular sequence!

Heart-pounding exercise #2: crashing DOWN. Breakfast over, I unlatched Alex's highchair tray and carried it into the kitchen. Then I heard a little voice behind me: "Black! Black!"

Now, what do we have at breakfast that's black? I wondered. And then I realized. And broke all previous land-speed records getting back into the dining room, where Alex was happily brandishing the black-handled knife I used to cut up her strawberries.

"No! No!" I yelled. And then, when the knife was safely on the table and Alex was obviously fine: "Yes, the knife is black. But it's also sharp. Not safe for babies. Not safe for babies. Not safe for babies."

"Black," Alex agreed.

Comments

[ailbhe]

Urple. Shark knives are one of the hazards that increases hugely when my in-laws are around. Have lots of sympathy.

(And you know, practically everyone who doesn't keep themselves firmly in check would call that counting. I'm going to tell Rob that Alex is counting, when he gets home.)

[rivka.livejournal.com]

Rob knows who Alex is?

Technically, knowing the names of the numbers and the order they come in is just part of counting. You also need to know:

1. that when you're counting objects, the highest number you get to = the total number there are.

2. that each object in an array is only counted once.

3. that wherever you start counting, you reach the same total.

4. that no matter what you're counting, counting itself happens in the same way.

Alex repeated the trick for Michael this evening, with peas. I started counting them and she added "five, six." But she couldn't answer the question "how many peas are there?", and so she isn't really counting.

[ailbhe]

Yes, he does, and we start saying "has started counting!" with excited voices when the number-recital happens. Um, except in children who have been formally taught it by rote, because that isn't as exciting. (OK, yes, we say "but she's only counting numbers, not *really* counting" too, but first we go all squee).