A first maths course for children aged four to six. Numbers nought to twenty shown three ways at once — the digit, the Khmer numeral and that many dots — then shapes and patterns, comparing and measuring, adding and taking away within ten, and the clock, the riel and the words for where things are. Then eight picture games to play. Every card reads itself aloud and carries the Khmer underneath, so a child can use it before they can read a single word.
Six areas, and they are not equally urgent. The order below is the order of importance, not the order you teach them in — and almost none of it is done with a pencil. At this age maths is something a child does with their hands, out loud, with real objects on a real table.
One number per object, touched as it is said, and the last number said is how many there are. A child who can chant to twenty but cannot tell you how many biscuits are on the plate has not learnt to count yet — they have learnt a song.
Both sets of numerals, because Cambodian school books, price tags and examination papers all use both. Matching 4, ៤ and four dots to each other is the single most useful thing on this page.
More, fewer, the same; bigger, longer, heavier. Sorting a pile by colour, then by size, then by shape — and noticing it can be sorted more than one way. This is where mathematical thinking starts, well before arithmetic.
Naming flat and solid shapes by their properties rather than their look, continuing a repeating pattern, and using in, on, under, behind and between correctly. Position words come up in maths questions long before numbers do.
Always with objects first, then pictures, then numbers — in that order and never skipping a step. The pairs that make ten are worth knowing by heart; everything in Grade 1 leans on them.
Five to ten minutes on one activity, then change. One idea a week, met again and again in different clothes. Twenty short minutes a day beats an hour on Sunday, and counting the stairs on the way up beats both.
Our tutors teach maths from the first number upwards — at home, at our office or online, in Khmer or English, at a pace a four-year-old can enjoy.