Games to play at 3am when they won’t go back to sleep…..

Friday, 18 April 2008 18:01

At 3am this morning, Sam wanted to play improper fractions.

The first thing I thought when I became conscious of a little face peering into mine was ‘oh, no...... I am soo tired!" followed by "what's an improper fraction?!!" and a mad dash to thinking back to my school days.

Well, Sam wouldn't go back to bed or to sleep, so I was hoping that the dark and him being on our bed would encourage him to also sleep. But no. At 3 am in the morning, my son was jumping up and down saying "mummy play improper fractions!"

 "The top one's bigger than the bottom....zzzzzz...."

 "The numerator's bigger than the denominator." My little wide awake boy giggled.

 So then we took it in turns to call out an improper fraction, with me drifting in and out of sleep, till I suggested two thirds and Sam stopped very seriously - "that's not an improper fraction. Mummy's wrong".

Then, because I was obviously not good at the game, he suggested we play remainders..... Sam's figured out that a remainder is what you get ‘....when division isn't the opposite of multiplication and there is something left......'  I'm not sure that Sam has cognitively worked out how to do remainders yet. He may just be memorising the answers....... but he loves playing remainder numbers.....

Sam's top 5 games currently are:

• Playing improper fractions
• Playing remainders
• Playing roads and avenues - that's where you take it in turns to call out the next street name in a drive from A to B - say from home to the shops.
• Playing wrestling games with Dad - Sam's title is "the super light weight champion of the world!" (nothing to do with numbers, this one, but heaps of fun!).
• Jumping hopscotch - he likes changing the sequences - like counting backwards in 2's.

You know, sometimes its tiring to keep up with Sam.... but if my son is still waking me up when he's 15 and wanting to play games with me, I'll be a lucky mum.