We were on the train today and my daughter noticed the number on the seat in front of us. She pointed it out, and then identified the second number as the number eight (she knows this one because it looks like a snowman!). I asked her what the other one was, and she surprised me by identifying it as six immediately! We read together, and she has her wipe clean number sheet, but I had no idea she could read the number six!

It was quiet then for a moment, and then she said “sixty eight”. I said “what?!”. She said “six and then eight so that’s sixty eight”. How the heck does she know that?! She can’t quite manage to count to twenty yet without skipping 15 or 16. Yet she can identify sixty bloody eight?!?!

I was stunned. What else does she know, that I don’t know she knows? And where on Earth is she getting it all from?! I know she’s interested in numbers & letters (she uses either word to describe both at the moment), and she’ll point them out when she sees them, and ask what they say. But I didn’t realise she’d been paying such attention. Or that she’d actually taken it in when she’s pointed out multi digit numbers (see, I’m so unprepared for this level of maths, I don’t even know the names for what we’re dealing with!) and I’ve broken them down into their individual digits before identifying the overall number.

I’d best be stepping my game up, before little miss Euler realises I’m totally winging it!

(And yes, I absolutely used google for that reference!)