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Fifteen Ideas for Encouraging Play at Home in Today’s Virtual Learning Environment Welcome to the first of several “idea-generating” articles created to support and ensure successful learning in an environment where school is partially or fully virtual. We know how challenging it can be to engage little ones in a virtual school environment, and yet…

Each year our middle school celebrates the circle and its mathematical relationships on “Pi Day,” March 14, using the date of 3/14 to honor the 3.14 approximation of pi. A local bakery donates pies and, in every math class, students measure round things and consume their pieces of pie. Amidst the Pi Day activities, students…

Subitizing! This ability to instantly “see” how many is a critical component in young students developing number sense.

The task of counting may seem simple, but as Ann Carlyle and Brenda Mercado point out in Teaching Preschool and Kindergarten Math, (Math Solutions, 2012), there is an important distinction between the rote or automatic counting that young children start with, and the eventual formulation of a deeper cognitive connection to the meaning of the…

Kindergarten is an important beginning. It can be the positive start of a child’s lifelong exploration of mathematical ideas or it can lay the first stones in what can become an impenetrable wall between “real math” and “school math.” In Growing Mathematical Ideas in Kindergarten, Linda and Rebeka present their vision of a kindergarten classroom…

First grade is the beginning of exposing students to mathematics. Counting, comparing, and grouping, as well as learning the comparison symbols <, =,>,  are key foundations in building a mathematical mindset. Try this game with your students, and give them a chance to practice comparing counters with a partner as they take turns shaking and…

From a Kindergarten and First-Grade Classroom After asking the students to come join me in a circle on the rug, I wrote the number 10 at the top of a piece of chart paper. Next I distributed interlocking cubes by carefully pouring them out near the students so that each child had access to them.…

It may surprise your students that many events in history present ways to explore mathematical ideas. In Day-to-Day Math: Activities for Grades 3-6, Susan Ohanian offers thought-provoking math class “openers” using interesting historical events.  Here are a few events to start your classroom investigations into history through a mathematical lense! January 23, 1951 The C102 jetliner makes history,…

How do you combine computation skills and a game in the same setting? The game Race to 200 helps students, and their partners, build their understanding of number computation, number sense, and place value. This game can be played during one class period, but we recommend trying all three versions, over three periods, so students can…

What constitutes good and meaningful math homework? Through a rich bank of math homework assignments, teachers come to see how homework can reinforce skills, prepare students for future lessons, extend their mathematical knowledge, and inspire their creativity. Take this example: Homework: If 3 is 5% of a number, what is 30% of that number?    …