Star Sense & Mindfulness

The dark night sky twinkled back at me more than I am used to this evening.  We are far from big cities. My mind wasn't on how many more stars I am seeing than when in NJ or Philly, but on how many exist all together.  

I attended a Singapore Math night at our kids school this evening.  Parents were led through each grade, K-6 and teachers laid out how the curriculum set up a strong "number sense" in each student's mind.  The beauty of the program is in the depth of learning and love of learning that each class is taken through.  It revamped math from the way I learned, how to churn out procedures, to now giving students tools to make the complex simple, with a strong base of familiarity in each problem.  Nurturing students into problem solvers instead of number crunchers. 

And so it must be with our stars. Multitudes hung and named in strategic places.   To the untrained eye, scattered and randomly seen, but to the trained, within orderly constellations reminding us of the current season and position of the earth within the universe. Will we be able to set up an infrastructure of "number sense" within a math curriculum to give our children an edge to begin to fathom the order and precision of the design of the stars? Shall we give them a glimpse of a few stars and teach their names and values and then one day take them to the country where they can see multiples upon multiples?

I'm encouraged by the Singapore Math Curriculum. I'm encouraged by the passion of the Grammar School Dean who ran the evening.  I'm encouraged by the process and potential as I contemplate how our children are trained, inspired, and learn to love to learn.  

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him? Psalm 8:3-4

Can you sense the mindfulness?