… boing…
…boing…
“one!”… boing… “two!”… boing…
And so it went one day when Junayd was jumping happily on his bed. He was jumping and counting, but when he reached 29, he faltered, at which his sister R. shouted, “thirty!” (**my heart melted at this point – she’s only two, mashaa`Allaah**)
And on he jumped, from 30-39… and then he faltered – this time, R. didn’t have an answer to give him. So I beckoned for him to join me where I was sitting on the floor, and told him to grab a sheet of paper and a pen. I wrote the numbers 1-10 vertically, asking him to count them as I wrote (which he did willingly). I then added a 0 next to the number 1, asking him what it was (and I already knew that he recognised 10), and he gladly shouted, “ten!”
Great.
I then proceeded to add a zero next to each number, helping him to add the -ty to the end as we he said them out loud, until we reached 100. It was like his little light-bulbed flicked on! An expression of understanding washed over his face… he understood!
He took the sheet of paper, climb back onto his bed and started from one again…
…boing… “one!”… boing… “two!”… boing… and when he got stuck at a -9, he’d looked down at the paper to figure it out. Anyone who’s done the 10-100 page on Starfall.com will know how the little boy shouts ONE hundred – that’s exactly what Junayd did!
A miracle, I tell you. Now, who said teaching and learning can’t be fun?
Go jump!
