Base Ten Blocks For First Grade

Building 11's.

I like this kid because so far every time he comes neither of us can believe how fast an hour goes by, and he's only six, in first grade. Base Ten Blocks make the math fun and easy...here are a couple of excerpts from our classes. These are good training for parents and teachers because they are great examples of the teaching concepts...remove the no from the lesson, degree of difficulty, placing the child in a situation where they can not fail, use of the rectangle to make it easy to count, addends and a general algorithm for counting past ten, introduction of algebra right away...



Tasking is not fun if the task assigned is no fun. He likes to play MineCraft, and builds stuff on his tablet and home computer. This is like building in MineCraft but specifically designed to teach math.  When they are in first grade math should be fun and easy. It should also be conceptually based. Symbols can wait. The same way we don't make very young children write English as they learn English there is no need to introduce symbols right away and in public schools they emphasize writing math way too early in my opinion.  They nead to hear the language and get fundamental concepts that they can see and get their hands on, symbols tend to muddy the waters and take away from clarity at this age and they really slow things down. Later when they see the symbols that stand for the numbers and operations they've heard it makes sense.



These videos show how to do it. Remember at this stage of the game all he is doing is counting and I am teaching him to discover how to count for himself...and how to say what he has done. We are basically figuring out how to count more quickly and easily. The brain WANTS to work fast but at this age it lacks training. But rather than drill facts I am showing him ways to count quickly. We also drop the algebra in right away.   Listen for the discoveries.



Little kids like math.  It's fun for them except when you make their hands hurt from so much writing.  You can see for yourself all the math facts he is getting consciously and subconsciously (and that is where the bulk of the learning takes place).

Don't get me wrong I have first grade worksheets, but you want to use them sparingly.  Look for more work with this kid on the Password protected pages and future blog posts here.

Update: He now has his own page, you'll find this post and more vids you won't find anywhere else at CRHOM. This snippet was made from a much higher quality vid using screencasting the vid at my website has better audio and video.


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Dboyz Playing Multiplication Minus Manipulatives.

Here are a couple of vids and links to more on multiplication, and tips on how to make it painless and maybe even fun. Spending a year doing worksheets over and over again is SO LAST CENTURY.



The idea is to mix it up, let fractions teach multiplication, let algebra teach multiplication, as well as story problems...and as in these to vids even when you are doing multiplication keep the drill work to a minimum play with blocks, make squares and rectangles. You can hear them say it's fun when I do the writing because they just have to say the answer. At this age writing is work...too many kids get turned off right here because you make it work. Multiplication makes math easy because it makes counting FAST. So right when they should be getting to the point where the math gets easier and easier because they can count fast, it's turned into work and no fun and boring memorization instead of a gateway to being able to do more complex and bigger problems. Remember math isn't just computation. Computation is how we DO math...but it's not the math.

Base ten blcoks and manipulatives can help make math fun if you use them correctly and you have the right kind of blocks. It's all about SPEED. Counting out lots of cubes or pieces takes too long.

Here we are practicing multi-digit multiplication. Unspoken is a lesson on place value and the names of numbers. Hear the "OH!" from the younger boy?



"They give it to you hard in school."

This way is "Easier than blinking."

The idea is to make it fun and if this is your first time to the blog these two have spent HOURS AND HOURS with blocks before we go here. Here is a page showing them learning some multiplication using base ten blocks.

Notice I do all the writing even though the older boy wants to do some...if we weren't on vid I might have let him do some but it slows things down when I'm trying to make a vid. and youtubers have no attention span. Writing on the whiteboard is fun. Writing in a workbook is not as much fun. You can see I also draw pictures and do a fast lesson on division with it.


When it's bigger it's just more multiplication tables. "Doesn't matter it's easy.

This is a long vid:



YOU write for them and it goes fast and easy. You can have them practice writing but I want them to practice math facts NOT making symbols. Writing slows everything down at this age and makes the books NO fun. Like I have said before be careful with worksheets. They usually take the fun out of math. This is also a great way to spend "quality time" with your kids...

Myth is because they can't write they can't do math...false. That's like saying because they can't write they can't speak English.

When you get right down to it it all we are doing is counting. Adding and multiplication is just counting quickly.

You also see multiplication and division go together...

I also give them exposure to the cubes. They have seen the square numbers before and it's good to now 1728 is a cube and so is 343 and so on...later they will recognize square numbers and cubes when they see them because they have been exposed to them.

I can't stress enough before you do what I'm doing in those vids you play with blocks and draw pictures! These boys have played with blocks for YEARS. Once they do they won't need blocks or symbols either. There are plenty of posts where they do math "in their heads."

3rd Power In His Head

Here is a gem. Don't tell me they have to have base 10 blocks or they will become block dependent using this method. Watch the older boy picture this problem

x³ + 9x² + 23x + 16 =

in his head...counting out the parts as he goes and then give it to me to solve.

This is a lesson on factoring and counting and multiplication...and how to be cool and have fun when you do math. The reason they don't need base 10 blocks is because they have been using base ten blocks...and we are learning by drawing and visualizing. Here is a post on 3rd power algebra where you can get an idea of what it is he is "looking at" in his head. We baby stepped our way here but now you begin to see the POWERFUL results of using this method.




More algebra at CRHOM. If you want to see more "advanced" algebra click on the "advanced algebra" tab.

We watched this together. The youngest boy pointed out that he drew 6x² + 10x + 4 and didn't get very much attention for it. He also told me the factors (you can see the drawing in black in front of him) (3x + 2)(2x + 2). "Come on, that was pretty cool dad." So we are going to make a new vid where he gets as much attention as his brother...

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Crewton Ramone's Completely Cool Curious Counters' Kindergarten Compendium

My book has been taking up quite a bit of my time lately but I am happy to report it is just about complete. You are no able to download a PDF off my website...you will of course need a password to do so and you will note it is officially Copyrighted so take it easy with the file sharing...and don't let me catch you trying to sell it for money unless you are an affiliate. I actually sent it in the the US Copyright Office. Now that doesn't mean I don't want you to share it. I do. And I have seen quite a bit about various artists who have gone the creative commons route and basically given their work away for free or for a donation and have forgone DRM of any kind. That's my plan. I'm not even going to attempt it. I know plenty of people will be willing to pay for it once they see it...and I know people will copy it. If you want to see more books like this some of you have better pay for it. It cost me quite a bit in time and money to get this thing done they way I wanted it done. I expect you will be pleased with the result. If you have comments I'd love to hear them.

I added an apostrophe after the S in "Counters" Crewton Ramone's Completely Cool Curious Counters' Kindergarten Compendium hopefully I catch a few other details like that before it hits the presses...

I expect people will share it. I also expect some people will get the PDF and really want to get a book or pay for a version that can go on their favorite E-reader. Like Kindle, iPad, Sony's E-Reader or Nook or what have you. It seems to me if you have an iPad or other tablet the PDF should be good enough.

The plan is to have it available on Smashwords which will push it to several formats, plain ol' regular PDF, a PDF with lots of hyperlinks to vids and web pages and of course an actual Hardcover Children's book. Right now the PDF is done.

I really want the hardcover book to stay around 10 bucks but that may or may not be realistic. As you can see it's full color and full color and lots of graphics adds to the cost of printing. I have a couple ideas for "pre-editions" that will hopefully pay for a run of hard cover books.

So I have quite a ways to go. I will probably start off with a soft cover pamphlet type where you take a 8 1/2 x 11 and fold it in half hit it with a stapler and there you are.

There is nothing like taking a book to bed, and although the concept is on it's way to being obsolete we are not there yet and I think kids will enjoy the rhymes and bright colors this book contains.

Here you see where I take a short digression into the concept of square roots, but mostly it is a book on addends and addition at the very end I introduce the concept of multiplication by two. It really is a book for 5 year olds (and under) and the idea is to have it be a bedtime story book that gets read over and over again like "Cat In The Hat" or your favorite Richard Scary book...my sons ask for the same books over and over again, why not teach them math while you are at it?

In this case you are just teaching them to count...by using addends. I also throw in some simple problem solving along the way and by the end of it we are ready for a problem where we add into the thousands.

This page uses symbols but most of the pages have the blocks on them in full color as you can see. The concepts are simple and any little kid will get it especially if you read 30 or 40 times (or more) over a couple of years...I know little kids who have "The King, The Mice, And The Cheese" memorized. Might as well memorize some math facts too...but up until now there hasn't been a book like this where they can SEE the numbers.

I will also make a screen cast where I point out what I had in mind when I made this book and how you might use it to best effect, and I will also point out a few things you might want to emphasize to your child. Also I would like to point out that older students will also enjoy this book because with our public school system the way it is the concepts in this book may be considered appropriate for students who are older. Perhaps much older.

I know I was supposed to work more on my website, especially the fractions page but this book kind of took on a life of it's own so I went with it. I am pleased with the result and think it will be worth the five or ten bucks it takes to get yourself a copy in whatever form you like best.

The Password Protected PDF's Page costs 5 bucks to get into. Once you have a Password you not only get this book for down load but a bunch of other PDF's and videos you won't find anywhere else. Hopefully this is just h beginning of the books. Supremely Simple Subtraction is partially finished and so is a coloring book and a few other things. Plus I have an endless amount of ideas for the many and varied topics that make up the mathematics, in such a fashion that they make sense and people can see how it all ties together to make up the beautiful language in which the universe is written.

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UPDATE: some of you just want the book, go HERE, scroll down and you can get the book all by itself, no password required:

PDF Prices

CCCCC $19.99 USD SSS Prinable $9.99 USD DDnDD $19.99 USD PDF Page Only $39.99 USD

Crewton Ramone Playing Math With A 7 Year Old. Intro Lesson.

Here is a good lesson for those with young children. This was a first time student who is being turned off to math at school. We had fun and she wants to come back for more.

What's Under The Cup Quickly Became Her favorite Game

Look for this lesson on the sample lessons page too. You need a password to see the other hours (and hours) of lessons there but here is this one for FREE. Soon Emma will have her own page because she is an excellent case study. She has been labeled ADHD or ADD and is on her way to SPED and I'm sure part of that is due to her not "getting" math and other subjects the way they are teaching it...thus she get bored or frustrated and acts out. This is a 7 year old child. I have seen no indication that she can not learn or stay engaged for 1 hour at a time. But what do I know...?

I am extremely biased against drugs for 7 year olds. I am also dubious when it comes to the ADD and ADHD diagnosis for bright little kids.

Mostly we played games like what's under the cup and making rectangles:

Building Rectangles and Playing Algebra? No problem.

She never figured out that most kids think algebra is harder than subtraction...which she informed me she doesn't like at all because "it's kinda hard and confusing." We will work on addends and clear all this up over the coming weeks. And you can watch the transformation at http://www.crewtonramoneshouseofmath.com/index.html. We didn't do any subtraction at all that she was aware of...but we will soon master that as well as quite a few other math concepts.

BTW password is going to change soon and prices for passwords are going UP this year.

Anyhow, here is a half hour of math...the hour went by in no time at all.



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Now available all manner of Mortensen Math Materials.

Another Fun First Grade Math Activity

There are plenty of games you can play that teach math.  At Crewton Ramone's House of Math there are pages of them. The page called "how to teach addition" has a bunch of games for addition but there are games for multiplication and algebra and more on my site and here on this blog. I put fun first grade math activity in the title but it could just as easily be a fun preschool math activity or a fun kindergarten math activity.

This is a story Jerry Mortensen came up with for teaching addends below ten...the numbers are having a party. Addends* are quite important and help students with many other aspects of mathematics (like subtraction). They are a basic building block that so many systems skip completely.



With little kids you want to play math...not drill math, and you need to play it enough so that they attain mastery and have instant recall. 2 + 2 = 4 is instant for most kids but 4 + 3 can take a a little longer and then 7 + 5 takes longer than that and they may resort to fingers. Get them off their fingers...but you start on their fingers.

There are only 45 addends in all. They should be mastered but don't spend all your time just doing addends, play other math games, do multiplication, sing songs, do algebra, fractions, problem solving etc. WHILE you are mastering addends...and all of these topics can be used TO master addends...and multiplication. Math is a language: it all goes together.

This idea of segmenting it down into individual parts that never become a cohesive whole ISN'T working.

*Addends: two numbers added together that make up another number. 7 + 3 are addends of 10 for example.

Algebra Is Child's Play

Here we see a six year old knocking out factoring problems with ease. He doesn't know factoring polynomials is supposed to be hard and that I've had to work with kids 10 years his senior on these exact same problems...only they were frustrated and confused.

We just did a few problems for fun first thing in the morning. His brother chose not to play, opting for cars instead which I am told is equally fun not really MORE fun. Algebra doesn't have to be painful. The basic concepts can be mastered at an early age thus freeing up the teen age years for other things, more math if they want or whatever topic catches their interest. This child will have ALL the math currently taught in public schools through sophomore year MASTERED by the time his is about 9 or 10. Notice I use the word mastered. This is completely different from "memorized to be forgotten", which is what is currently the norm in classrooms through out the country, including our universities...

Here is a very short vid showing him developing his problem solving skills, along with a host of other math skills used for factoring polynomials.



Here you can see his progress. Algebra gets easier and easier as he gets better at counting and making symbols.


Learn more at The House Of Math.