Number Sense

“But I learned it that way”: The case for student-invented strategies

Recently, I have been receiving a lot of push back from parents and teaches who don’t think it is worthwhile to expose students to methods other than traditional algorithms. They tell me how they memorized the procedures in math class and they don’t understand why their students or children can’t do the same. They complain about all these diagrams I encourage …

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Number Talks

In my last post, I talked about the importance of fostering mental math strategies in class. A great resource for how to think about doing this in your class is Sherry Parrish’s book Number Talks: Helping Students Build Mental Math and Computation Strategies, Grades K-5.   I highly recommend taking some time to read the book …

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Mental Math

My sister gets nervous sometimes when we are at the store together.   She is afraid (rightfully so) that she may have to witness me give a math lesson at the cash register.   I can see why it might be embarrassing to her and I can also see why it infuriates people behind me in line, …

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