Quick Look Widget

A quick look is a dot card for the How Many Do You See? routine. A card of dots appears for a moment and then a cover comes down. Learners say how many dots they saw, then the card can come back to show one way to see it, such as "2 and 2 make 4".

The short look is on purpose. A child can't count the dots one by one in two seconds, so they learn to see the group: three dots like a dice face, four in a square. That's how children come to recognize small numbers at a glance, and seeing the parts ("2 and 2") is the first step toward adding.

Berdee draws the card itself, so a dice-face 5 or a 5-frame 4 always looks the same and always has exactly that many dots.

Select the quick look on the canvas and click the floating ⚙ Configure button to set it up. The settings come in four groups, in the order you plan the routine: The card, How children see it, How children answer and After the answer. Settings most lessons never change are under More options. Press Try it as a student to run the card exactly as a student will see it. Step-by-step: Flash a dot card for How Many Do You See?.

How a student uses it

1. The card starts face down. The learner taps Look. You can also start it from a behavior, so the card never flashes while a child is still listening to the instructions (see Start the look from the scene).
2. Ready, set, look! Three big dots light up one at a time while Berdee says the words, so children who can't hear it still know when to look.
3. The card shows for the time you set, then a patterned card back slides over it. It's clearly a cover, not a blank screen.
4. If you allow it, a Look again button gives one more look. Then it goes away.
5. The learner taps a numeral. After a right answer, the card comes back with a ring around each part, one ring at a time, and a line such as "2 and 2 make 4".

After a wrong answer the card stays covered and the learner can try again: Look again is their second look. To uncover it instead, turn on Uncover the card after a wrong answer under More options.

The card

• Arrangement:
• Dice face (1–6): the dot patterns children know from dice. A good place to start.
• 5-frame (1–5) and 10-frame (1–10): dots fill the boxes from the left, like a ten frame, so 7 reads as 5 and 2 more.
• In a line: harder to see at a glance than a pattern.
• Pairs: dots in twos.
• Scattered: no pattern, so children group the dots themselves. Every student sees the same card. Press Shuffle for a new one.
• Two colors (2–10): a red part and a yellow part. You choose how many are red. Yellow dots are drawn as rings, so the parts differ by more than color.
• One missing (1–5): a dice face with one empty spot, such as 4 in a square with one gone. Shuffle moves the gap.
• How many dots: also the right answer. The range depends on the arrangement.
• Show: dots, or a picture from your library placed once for every dot (ducks, frogs).

How children see it

• Quick look: the card shows for a moment, then is covered. Stay on screen leaves it up with no time limit.
• Show the card for: half a second to 3 seconds. 2 seconds is a good start. The time starts when the card actually appears on screen, so a slow device doesn't shorten it.
• Allow one more look: children can tap Look again once after the card is covered.

How children answer

• Tap a number: five big number buttons that include the answer. The answer isn't always in the middle. This is graded.
• No answer here: the card only shows, and isn't graded. Ask the question with another widget, and show it from the card's On Card Covered behavior.

After the answer

• Show how to see it: after a right answer (the default), after any answer, or don't show it. The card comes back with a ring around each part.
• Ring these parts: which way to ring the card, when there's more than one. The choices come from the arrangement: a dice 5 is "4 and 1" or "2, 1 and 2", a dice 6 is "3 and 3" or "2, 2 and 2", a two-color card is its red and yellow parts.

More options

• "Ready, set, look!" countdown: on by default. Turn it off to show the card the moment Look is tapped.
• Say the countdown and the parts out loud: uses the device's own voice.
• Uncover the card after a wrong answer: off by default.
• Words with the rings: what to show and say with the rings. Leave it empty for "2 and 2 make 4".

Example: flash 4 as a dice face, then show 2 and 2

1. Add a Quick Look from the toolbox and click ⚙ Configure.
2. Under The card, set Arrangement to Dice face and How many dots to 4.
3. Keep Quick look, 2 seconds and Allow one more look.
4. Keep Tap a number, and Show how to see it: After a right answer. Set Ring these parts to 2 and 2.
5. Press Try it as a student, then Save.

The cards the How Many Do You See? routine starts with are all one quick look each: 3 like a dice face; 1, 2 and 3 as a pair and one more (a Pairs card of 3); two different arrangements of 2 (Dice face and In a line); and 3 with one missing (One missing, 3).

Grading and what you see

A quick look is graded on the answer alone: right when it matches the number of dots. Using Look again, or taking a while, never lowers the grade. Each numeral tap counts as one attempt, so a perfect run is one attempt. Looking is never an attempt.

On each student's attempt page you see the answer, the looks and the time:

• Answered 4 · one look · 1.8 s ✓
• Answered 5 · looked twice · 7.2 s ✗

The time runs from the moment the cover came down. A quick right answer after one look is what seeing without counting looks like. A slow one after two looks probably means the child counted. The widget shows you the evidence; you decide.

With No answer here the card isn't graded (0 of 0) and never holds a learner back.

Use it in logic

A quick look has two events:

• On Card Covered: when the cover comes down after a look.
• On Answer: when a learner taps a numeral.

It reports Answer, Dots on the card, Looks and Is covered, alongside Is correct and Is answered, and it has three methods: Start the look, Show how I saw it and Start over. See Widget properties and methods.

Start the look from the scene

Give the instruction first, then start the look with Start the look:

• When the child is ready: add a Ready! button whose On Press runs Start the look on the quick look.
• After a pause: add a hidden timer with Auto Start on, set to the length of your spoken instruction, and run Start the look from its On Timer Complete.

Either way the card won't flash until the child has heard the question.

Ask with another widget

Choose No answer here and hide a multiple choice question at first. On the quick look's On Card Covered, show it. Learners answer only once the dots are gone.

Accessibility

• The time limit is the exercise. It's what stops counting one by one. The card is never covered before the countdown ends, Look again gives a second chance, and Stay on screen removes the limit for students who need it. Make a second version of the lesson with Stay on screen and assign it to those students.
• Nothing flashes or blinks. The card appears once and is covered once. When a device asks for reduced motion, the cover and the rings appear without sliding.
• Screen readers hear "Dot card", never the number. Saying "4 dots" would answer the question. Everything else is announced and works from the keyboard: Look, the countdown, "Card covered. How many did you see?", Look again and the numerals.
• Big targets. Look, Look again and the numerals are well above the tap-size floor. The Configure dialog warns you when the numerals would be too small; make the widget bigger.

Related

• Counting collection: count a collection one object at a time.
• Ten frame: build numbers with counters.
• Reusable lesson patterns: the How Many Do You See? pattern.
• Choose the right widget