Young Mathematicians at Play

 

It seems with the current focus on mathematical content, we have forgotten that play is critical for childrens' learning. Our session explored how to support the development of young mathematicians through purposeful play. We used manipulative-based games with a focus on the Standards for Mathematical Practice and the content domain of Number & Operations in Base Ten, including number sense, computation, and estimation. Let's bring play and creativity back into our classrooms!

Here is the link to a folder with resources for my NCTM 2017 presentation "Young Mathematicians at Play." If you search "math games", you will find links to past presentations with resources for additional games.



A big thank you to ETA hand2mind for sponsoring this presentation! We were able to give away all of the manipulatives they provided for this session!

Mathematical Practices at Play

Standards for Mathematical Practice

Today Dave and I presented at the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics Annual Conference in San Francisco. We were most fortunate to be joined by three Grand Valley State University elementary teachers in training. Our presentation focused on finding opportunities to support the development of the Standards for Mathematical Practice with math games as a shared context between teachers and students.





In our session, participants got hands-on practice playing some simple but challenging math games.

Lauren, Megan, & Kaileigh
also affectionately
known as "Larry, Moe, & Curly"
to the #MTBoS

Lauren, Megan, & Kaileigh shared some their research around the Mathematical Practices from a GVSU Department of Mathematics capstone project with our participants.

Here is a PDF of the session PowerPoint, which includes links to resources and a list of materials needed for each game. Click here to download the procedures and any of the game boards/hand outs that do not have a copyright.

We also want to shout out a big thanks

to ETA Hand2Mind for their support by providing manipulatives for our presentation!

NCTMNOLA: Playing with the Common Core

NCTMNOLA participants playing one of the games

This past week, I had the pleasure of presenting, with my husband Dave, my workshop Playing with the Common Core  at the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) Annual Meeting and Exposition in New Orleans. The official Twitter hashtag for this conference is #NCTMNOLA. I encourage you to check it out.

Shared Context

This workshop focuses on using a variety of games to establish a shared context within the classroom. Having a shared context provides teachers with an opportunity to develop narratives, or stories, based on the context so they don't leave learning to chance. At the same time, all of these games address both the CCSSM Content Standards and the Standards for Mathematical Practice. 

These games are excellent for use throughout the school year because they intertwine most of the content standards in Operations & Algebraic Thinking (OA) and  Numbers in Base Ten (NBT) for grades K-2. Each of the games can also be modified for other grade levels, either up or down.

Resources

For the slide presentation and "procedures" for each of the five games that were played click on the link below:

NCTMNOLA Playing with the Common Core (slide presentation and other resources)

Some of the games we played are copyrighted. For those resources, click on the links below:

Part-Whole Bingo, came from Contexts for Learning's resource Games for Early Number Sense. Scroll down to the "Year-long Resource Guides" and you can download a resource summary.

Roll-A-Square was adapted from Investigations in Number, Data, and Space®, 2nd grade module "Putting Together and Taking Apart: Addition and Subtraction"

How Many More To . . . was adapted from Carolee Norris' Focus on Math Blog

My original Playing with the Common Core session from GVSU's Math in Action 2013

Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions! My contact information is on the last page of the slide presentation. I'd also love it if you would leave a comment.

Resources for Developing Number Sense

I just finished "How to Learn Math", my first MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) with Dr. Jo Boaler, a math education specialist from Stanford University, and author of What's Math got to do With It? I'll be writing more about what I learned in future posts, but wanted to share these links first. Below are some resources that Jo shared for developing number sense from one of her graduate students, Dan Meyer: 

motion math
Conceptua Math
Buzz Math
ST Math
Refraction
Link to Maria Anderson's blog post for more great resources
Center for Game Science

Here are a few more that I found yesterday:

TERC  If you click on the "Products and Publications" page, there are several dozen more links to amazing resources. I've posted the link to one of them "Mixing in Math", because it's great for parents.
Mixing in Math
Contexts for Learning
Beyond Facts & Flashcards

If you have additional resources, I invite you to post them in the comments.

MCTM 13 Playing with the Common Core

Wonderful, flexible participants!

This week I had the opportunity to revise my presentation "Playing with the Common Core", and present it at the Michigan Council of Teachers of Mathematics Annual Conference (MCTM) in Traverse City. One of those revisions was co-presenting with my husband and GVSU mathematics educator, David Coffey.

Other revisions included changing the schema activation, refining the focus on the Standards for Mathematical Practice from the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics, reducing the number of games during the activity, and adjusting the final organizing and integrating activity. And, since I just finished Thinking Collaborative's Adaptive Schools training, I added some things I learned about being a better facilitator.

Luckily, my worst fears--that no one would attend our session, the desks in the room would be the old fashioned slanted type, and that Dave would talk too long--did not come to pass. Instead, we planned for 30 participants and had 70+ in a room designed for about 32! We made some on-the-spot adjustments and were so thankful that our participants were all extremely flexible and understanding. I thank all of you again.

Here is the link to my Dropbox folder for this presentation. Directions for all three games are in the folder, as well as my PowerPoint slides, CCSSM Content Standards for K-2 and the CCSSM Standards for Mathematical Practice. Several of the game items used in the session are copyrighted and therefore are not in the folder. Links for additional games can be found in my original post Playing With the Common Core. If you have any questions about any of the games, please contact me directly via email.

Playing With the Common Core

AL Abacus for Race to 100

This past Saturday, I presented at Math In Action 2013. This conference for K-12 mathematics teachers is hosted every February by Grand Valley State University.  My one hour session (view my PowerPoint presentation here) was Playing With the Common Core. Here's the outline of my lesson plan for the session: 

Objective: The learner will explore using strategic early number sense games as a context for intentional instruction.

Schema Activation:  (10 min) The role of context in intentional instruction. Read aloud the first page of Grandma Eudora's T-Shirt Factory from Contexts for Learning Mathematics. Briefly highlight within the story contexts for the 5 & 10 structures, use of a "T-chart" as a place value mat, and finally composing and decomposing two-digit numbers. Participants turn and talk about the role of context in instruction.

Focus:  (10 min) Review the Common Core State Standards for Mathematics (CCSSM) Content Standards & CCSSM Standards for Mathematical Practice (SMP) for grades K - 2, with emphasis on the SMP.

Activity: (20 min) Session participants explore and play the following Early Number Sense Games. Click on the link for a materials list.

• Roll-a-Square
• Part-Whole Bingo
• Race to 100
• Exchange Game
• Make 20
• Tens Go Fish

Reflection: (20 min)  Reflect on the games you played and write your own scenario anchored in the context of one of the games you played. Special focus on the Standards for Mathematical Practice.

Don't leave learning to chance--you can center your instruction by setting up a scenario around a game that has been a common shared experience by the students in your classroom. This can be done with individual students, in a small group for intervention, within your mathematics workshop, or even whole group. Examples:

• Race to 100: (Content Std: Count by 10 from any number; SMP: Mathematical structure) "Remember when we were playing Race to 100? Let's say I'm on 14. What if I rolled three tens in a row? Where would I land at the end of each turn?"

• Part-Whole Bingo: (Content Std: composing & decomposing numbers; SMP: Problem Solving) "What if I just rolled a seven and all of the towers with seven are filled? What could I do to be sure to use all seven of my cubes?"

From a teacher perspective, write a short narrative scenario that you can use in your classroom related to both a CCSSM Content Standard, and more importantly, one or more of the Standards for Mathematical Practice that is anchored in the game(s) you explored.

                                                                *   *   *   *   *  

Early Number Sense

One in five adults in the United States is functionally innumerate; they do not possess the mathematical competencies needed for many modern jobs.  (Geary,  Hoard, Nugent, & Bailey,  2013).

In the three sections of MTH 222, Mathematics for Elementary Teachers II, that I'm teaching this semester at Grand Valley State University, my students are learning about research-based games that help elementary students develop number sense and gain a conceptual understanding of place value. An article in the Education Week blog Inside School Research features the results of a longitudinal study published in the current edition of the online journal, PLoS ONE. The study found that number sense is a better predictor of students' later math achievement than counting or other speed-based measures. The authors go on to conclude that "first grade number system knowledge predicts seventh grade functional numeracy" (Geary et al., 2013). As teachers, we must be prepared to assess and evaluate our student's early number sense. And, more importantly, provide appropriate intervention experiences that immerse our students in rich experiences that expand their early understandings of the relationships between numbers.

So, tonight I was doing a Google search for games that promote number sense--in particular a game called Part-Whole Bingo from Contexts for Learning Mathematics Investigating Number Sense, Addition and Subtraction. I came across a blog post I wrote on 'Mrs. Coffey's Classroom Blog' a few years ago when I was teaching 1st grade at Edgewood Elementary school at Fruitport Community Schools. What a wonderful surprise!

Here is the photo I posted on that blog on February 26, 2010.

I'll be using this game, as well as a few others, in my presentation at the  Math In Action 2013 Conference this Saturday at GVSU and introducing it to my pre-service teachers in class next week.

Geary DC, Hoard MK, Nugent L, Bailey DH (2013) Adolescents’ Functional Numeracy Is Predicted by Their School Entry Number System Knowledge. PLoS ONE 8(1): e54651. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0054651