Expertise

This morning, attempting to speak in code to Dale, I said, "Were you aware that tomorrow there will be a high-temperature midday meal?" Aaron, not missing a beat, said, "Oh, is it a hot lunch day?" Um, yes.

Jordan, meanwhile, has begun to self-identify as being Good At Math. I have to agree with him. He continues to enjoy working with negative numbers:

Jordan: Mommy, five minus ten is negative five. Right?
Rachel: Yes, that's totally right. How did you figure that out?
Jordan: Because a ten is two fives, so if you have five and you take away one five, that's zero, and then you take away another five and that's negative five.

Wow. The other day in the car we were about to get onto the freeway, and Jordan was trying to decide whether to close his window:

Jordan: How long will we be on the freeway?
Rachel: Just a few seconds. We're getting on and then right away getting off again.
Jordan: How many seconds?
Rachel: I don't know. Here, we're getting on, you want to count?
Jordan: (counts silently until we get off) Forty seconds, Mama.
Rachel: Forty seconds. That's less than a minute. Do you know how many seconds in a minute?
Jordan: No.
Rachel: Sixty. Sixty seconds in a minute.
Jordan (pausing): So we had twenty more seconds before it would be a minute.
Rachel: Wow, that's right! Tell me how you know that.
Jordan: Because if you had four seconds, you would need two more to make six seconds, and this is the same thing only it's the tens family. So if you have forty seconds you need twenty more seconds to make sixty seconds and that's a minute.
Rachel (aware of the research on praising effort rather than ability): Jordan, you know, that is really something that you know how to figure that out. I can tell that you have put a lot of effort and thoughtfulness into learning math. You must really have been practicing, and thinking about what you are doing while you are practicing, to be able to do stuff like that.
Jordan: Yes and you know what Mommy? It's because I like math. That makes it fun to do it, almost like no work at all, so I just keep doing and doing it without even minding, and that way I get a lot of practice. So I get good at it because I like it and so I practice a lot.

It's a whole theory of expertise, really, sort of a snowball theory. I went on to tell him that I thought pretty soon he would start liking reading, too (it's currently more labor than fun, for him), once he has a little more practice.