In Sarath’s class, they have a jar which is filled with different items each week and the kids have to guess the number of items in the jar. Then they count the items and the kids who guessed the closest get a prize. So, on Firday, I was talking to Sarath about his day and he said, he got a red point (bad behavior point) during guestimation.
Me: Why did you get a red point?
Sarath: Because I guessed -66 during guestimation.
Me: Do you know that there cannot be negative numbers in the jar.
Sarath: Yeah. I know that. I was able to see the items in the jar. There were definitely more than 10 items.
Me: Then why did you guess -66?
Sarath: Because, I had to guess a number. -66 is a number right? So, I guessed it.
I did not know what to do other than telling him that he should not guess negative numbers. What do you think? Would you think this type of behavior is funny, just a kid behavior or a bad behavior?
I should say its a different way of thinking.
I guess it is a different way of thinking 🙂
In math -5 is a valid no. I think he will get it better as he master the addition and substractio concept better 🙂
He knows the difference between positive and negative numbers and also knows that he cannot guess negative numbers. He just likes to do this for fun in class and it annoys the teacher.