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Category: Grades K-2

Pattern and the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics

Pattern and the Common Core State Standards in Mathematics

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Mathematics is often described as the science of pattern.  Through looking for, reasoning about, and describing numeric and geometric patterns, students come to realize that mathematics reflects order and predictability.  This is a significant discovery because students who understand the power of patterns in math are more confident in their ability to do math.  So when the Common Core State Standards first came out and I didn’t see a whole lot about pattern and patterning activities in the early years,…

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The Estimation Jar – Number Sense in Action

The Estimation Jar – Number Sense in Action

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I was cleaning up the Estimation Table at my last Family Math Night event when I noticed a slip of paper next to the Hershey’s jar.  Taking a closer look at it, I realized I was looking at the thinking behind someone’s guess as to the number of Hersheys in the jar. This piece of paper is priceless to me as an educator.  It allows me to clearly understand the steps this child took to arrive at his/her answer – an answer…

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Counting Money at Family Math Night

Counting Money at Family Math Night

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Back in the early 2000s, my husband and I joined forces, he as a software engineer and me as a teacher, to design a kids savings and money management software program.  We called it KidsSave.  In that program we included a fun way to teach kids basic money skills.  It was such a powerful tool that we decided to include it for free on our kids and money website. One of my favorite features of the KidsSave Money Counter is…

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Family Math Night What Do You Notice? Poster

Family Math Night What Do You Notice? Poster

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The Common Core State Standards in Mathematics is really emphasizing number lines in student work with numbers.  So I thought I’d include one on a What Do You Notice? Poster at last night’s Family Math Night event.  But in order to reflect both the primary and intermediate grades, not only did I include the counting numbers, but I marked the fourths, as well. Some students noticed the color pattern I used – even numbers are blue and odd are red….

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Family Math Night What Do You Notice? Poster

Family Math Night What Do You Notice? Poster

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So for this What Do You Notice? poster, I decided to tie in rectangular arrays with prime and composite numbers.  That said, whatever math-y thing students notice is totally acceptable.  For example, one student noticed that the “buildings” had square windows.  Great.  That’s a little bit of geometry.  Another student noticed that each set of colored rectangles included the same number of squares.  Again, great, as that required some counting and comparison.  Just like the student who noticed that there are…

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