You may have seen a craze involving colorful elastic bands.
Don't despair! It is teaching children mathematics and geometry including Pascal's triangle and Fibonacci sequences. Even young children are learning terms such as hexagon and rhombus.
Furthermore, kids are also learning reading skills and fine motor skills while making friends and gaining confidence. Many are also learning about economics.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by choose another one on Monday July 07 2014, @08:36AM
True, except that dropping stuff _is_ how kids learn about gravity etc. Watching babies & toddlers learn is actually fascinating - there are so many things that as adults we just "know", but actually it was so long ago that we've forgotten we had to learn them.
Dropping plates when very young teaches them about entropy, and when slightly older teaches them maths & economics as it is deducted from pocket money...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by TGV on Monday July 07 2014, @08:46AM
I'm not denying the learn that gravity exists, but they don't learn what it is or anything about Newton's laws. That all comes as a big surprise when they start learning physics. They don't even understand why their rubber ducky stays afloat in the bath. Hell, they use words, but at age 8, they cannot distinguish a subject from a relative pronoun.
So, if I'm saying that these elastic bands teach them the same about Pascal and Fibonacci as dropping a plate teaches them about gravity and Newton, I'm saying that they do not learn any mathematical concepts.