Number of the Day: Daily Number Sense Routines
A daily number sense routine is one of the simplest ways to strengthen students’ understanding of numbers. Spending just a few minutes each day exploring a single number helps students…
Number Lines
Making Sense of Rounding
Have you ever thought that maybe people who think they are not good at math really have just never been taught math in a way that makes sense to them?…
Drawing Number Lines to Visualize Equivalent Fractions
The idea of fractions being equivalent is such a key understanding for helping students develop “fraction sense” that it absolutely must be done right. Students need to see a variety…
Fractions on a Number Line with Cuisenaire Rods
A couple of days ago, I blogged about equivalent fractions, and I promised a follow-up post about fractions on the number line. This post contains affiliate links, which simply means…
Ordering Numbers on a Number Line
Workstation activities don’t need to be complicated. They just need to allow students to practice their standards! Take for example this little workstation activity for ordering numbers on a number…
Alligators Are for Swamps, Not Comparing Numbers
There, I said it. And while I’m at it, PacMan is soooooooo 70s! It’s time to move past using alligators for comparing numbers. There are really two steps involved in…
Recording Addition on a Hundred Chart
Make no mistake—the standard algorithm remains the goal for multi-digit addition and subtraction. But research and experience show that introducing students to alternate strategies first helps build the deep understanding…
More Mental Math Strategies
After a recent post on addition strategies, I had a reader email me and ask about subtraction strategies. She was working with her daughter on homework, and while she understood…
Exploring Addition Strategies on an Open Number Line
In a previous post, I wrote about using a 120 chart for adding 2-digit numbers. In this post, I’m going to put some names to those mental strategies and show…
