The Bub in the Belly

Here's a video of Ryan doing the linking memory exercise at home. This is a memory game that we play in Shichida, where the child arranges a set of cards according to a prescribed sequence.

In class, the sensei has been revising 10 cards every week (from set 2A). For this Sunday's class, the sensei will revise the fourth and last group of 10 cards (cards 31-40). The following class, the children will be asked to link all the cards (cards 1-40) in 3 minutes or less.

At home, we have been linking 40 cards for some time and we are at the point where Ryan doesn't need to revise the sequence beforehand - he just gets down to business straightaway and gets the cards in order. Sometimes, he is not in the mood to arrange the cards, in which case he will simply recite the sequence to me verbally.

The first part of the video shows Ryan arranging the set for this Sunday's class revision, which are the cards from 31 to 40. After that, I asked him to arrange the cards from 1-40, which he does. In the video, we are doing the exercise very slowly because we are on the floor and it's a little awkward for Ryan to get around the cards - you can see that he's constantly tidying the lineup. Also, although he can arrange the cards quite effortlessly, he is actually not at his most enthusiastic - yesterday he did not want to play this game at all (he only wanted to recite the names of the cards verbally) - so today we are easing back into it slowly. When we are doing it "properly", with no lagging, Ryan can complete the exercise in under 2 minutes. If I do the arranging as he recites the names of the cards, we can get it done in under a minute.