I finally figured out that Gareth loves the white part of the hard-boiled egg, but isn’t such a fan of the yolk. I’m not a fan of either and Ryan loves the yolk. I’m pretty certain that Gareth has eaten an entire hard-boiled egg before, yolk and all, but the last couple of times I’ve given him one he’s eaten one piece (usually an end) and left the rest. Today I finally put two and two together and realized that he didn’t want the yolk. Sure enough, once I got rid of the yolk he gobbled the white down.
Patterns are kinda hard to explain to a three-year-old. Much harder than simple addition. Maybe there are some other kids Gareth’s age whose parents have taught them about patterns and who totally understand these already, but I’m not that on top of things. I splurged a bit and purchased this game/toy from a Discovery Toys party (it was on sale for a great price). I debated a bit about buying it since, theoretically, I could make something similar myself using objects from around our house and making my own cards. But, again, I’m not that on top of things or motivated. It’d stay on my list of “things to do” until one day I’d realize Gareth’s in college already. So I decided it was worth it to help encourage myself to start teaching him simple math.
Anyway, they’ve got all these cards that go with the bugs. The cards get progressively more difficult, starting with simple sorting and matching and moving on to patterns and eventually basic addition. Trying to get Gareth to notice the pattern was extremely difficult. I’ve realized that I’m just not sure how to explain the concept to him. But, I’m used to having to find different ways to explain ideas, so hopefully I’ll come up with something helpful for him eventually!
Of course, part of our difficulty figuring out patterns may be because Gareth was showing some similar traits to his Auntie Michaela. He didn’t want to have anything to do with the earlier, easier cards. Nope, no building up from the basics for this kid, start out at the hardest ones for him! (Our childhood pediatrician once commented that my sister wanted to start in graduate school and go from there. I don’t know how accurate she’d say this is now, but I remember there being some instances where it was very accurate growing up.) I’m not sure that that trait combined with the perfectionism he seems to have inherited from me is a great combination.
Oh, and if an insect’s name has the word “dragon” in it, Gareth will never, ever fail to correctly identify said insect (at least when it’s in plastic toy form).
