Maths, apparently

I recently found and printed off a bunch of stuff from the CIMT's Mathematics Enhancement Programme (Primary Extension). I have no idea what's supposed to be "innovative" about it, but the children enjoy it (Linnea, who is five, tries to actually do the exercises and Emer, who is three, colours things in and cuts them out, but they both have the same print-outs, so they're happy).

Linnea likes it except for not feeling confident to read the instructions unless she's alone, and not feeling confident to do the exercises unless I say "that looks right to me, what do you think?" a lot. On the other hand, it does mean she's letting me be involved in something, which is fabulous for me. And mainly she's working through things she finds very easy usually, but doing them slowly and self-critically, with an element of checking-her-work she hasn't usually shown me.

Along with a recent tendency to do things for reward, which she never used to accept, I wonder whether she's reached a stage where she's willing to perform a bit? I mean, willing to do things explicitly knowing there's praise or not-praise at the end of it? That's a big leap for her, and I'm not sure how I feel about it.

Meanwhile, she likes <, > and = very much but would like to introduce V and a sort of bar-less A for other values, like "kind of the same" and "not actually more but bigger anyway."