Strong in Math

I am seeing more and more evidence that my students this year are very strong in math.  I am a very linguistic person, and math really wasn't my thing in school.  I am the nerd who enjoys reading, is decent at writing and doesn't mind editing writing.  Don't get me wrong, I love teaching math, it just isn't something I was good at in school, and Language Arts is more my thing.

Last week, my students proved to be better at me in math when they were able to easily make shapes from smaller shapes.  Meanwhile, their teacher was still manipulating the shapes (more than once) trying to turn them to make a new shape.  I know what I need to use, but it takes me a while to manipulate them to make what I want.

I have a student from a local university working with me this semester with the thought that she will student teach with me next semester.  She will be teaching some lessons this week, and a requirement of her teaching is that she give students a written pretest.  Her lessons will be on addition.  She gave students a sheet with addition problems on it and asked them to do their best.  I have not introduced addition yet (shame on me).

As I walked around while they were taking this pretest, I was shocked to see students counting on their fingers and actually figuring the problems out.  7/23 students had a perfect score! Tomorrow is the introduction to addition lesson.  I am interested to hear the thinking of these students who already know how to add.

Many of my students are struggling in Language Arts, but it great to see their success in math.  I am hoping my comfort with Language Arts will help me bring success to my students in this area!

What are your students' strengths?