School of Thought

Making Math Relatable

  

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Mrs. Slocum has extensive experience teaching math to students with learning differences.   Her approach is fresh and always entertaining. 

Nil, nada, none…..from a very early age, we teach our children that ZERO has no value. It is a great big goose egg used only as a place holder. Yes, that means it is like someone saving a seat for a friend. So, with that in mind, let’s look at our world population.  We are fast approaching the 7,000,000,000 mark – that’s seven billion. Sounds simple – just two words representing a whole lot of nothing, if you count all the zeros.  How does the world population number compare with the US population number of slightly over 300,000,000 – that’s 300 million.  Not too much of a difference – it is just missing one zero. When in reality we know that a missing zero is worth so much more.  So, how do we make these numbers real to our children? We have to start by making them more than just squiggly lines on a page. We have to literally find a way for them to touch the numbers. Remember, baby steps first. We will start small and work our way up.

One simple way is to pick up a box of Popsicle sticks – usually less than $10 for 1,000 sticks. Kids can practice counting and grouping small arrangements of 5 or 10.  How many groups would they need to reach 100? 500? 1,000? They can even work with the sticks to determine if a number is a composite or a prime. What would they do to find half of five? That would require breaking one of the sticks in half.  Other ways to have fun with counting and sorting might include allowing your child to color or paint the sticks for use.

What do you do if your child does not quite understand that 1x10, 5x2, and 2x5 are all equal to 10?  You can use the Popsicle sticks to physically demonstrate that one group of 10, five groups of two, and two groups of five all contain a total of 10 sticks. You can also do the same with colored pony beads. Choose two favorite colors and then string them onto a shoe string with a knot or bow at one end. Follow the pattern of alternating colors after you complete a grouping. One group of 10 would all be one color; where as five groups of two would require you to change colors after every two beads. (Ex: xx oo xx oo xx  OR  xxxxx ooooo) Shoe strings usually come eight to a pack at the dollar store. It is a simple and inexpensive way to create your own multiplication table on separate strings. You can then line up your strings to see eight groups of three, six groups of four, and two groups of twelve all equal 24. This then relates to understanding how 100 pennies, 10 dimes, 20 nickels, 4 quarters can “go into” a dollar. Maybe we should start this training with our political representatives first……have you seen the large number representing our deficit…..14 Trillion….that’s just way too many zeros! Seriously though, to help our children succeed, we have to make these numbers real.  Let’s put it in their hands…..literally!

Helpful links: 

http://www.mhschool.com/math/2009/ca/assets/factdash.html

http://coolmath.com/

http://mathplayground.com/

http://www.playkidsgames.com/games/timezAttack/timezAttack.htm

Images courtesy of flickr Creative Commons

Chesapeake Bay Academy-Math Techniques: fox43tv.com