Zooming the Number Line

Presented with a problem of rounding in Museum of Mysteries, by David Glover, BatBoy makes a very common mistake:  He wants to round 7651 to 7600.  At least I know he is not just memorizing the answers (or at least it is very clear when he has just memorized an answer) because he makes this same mistake every time he comes to this point in the story.  7651 seems to be closer to 7600 than to 7700 because there appear to be more similarities between 7651 and 7600.

Yet, when presented with a number line, BatBoy can find the midway point between 7600 and 7700, and then deduce that 7651 is, in fact, closer to 7700.  But we need to draw this diagram over and over again.

Observing Number Explorations

SpiderGirl has always been a social learner.  With her, we talk, do things, play games.  Without the social engagement, she does not seem much interested in exploring numbers.  BatBoy, on the other hand, is very much more introverted in his learning style.  Unless he has specific questions, he just wants me to get out of his way and let him do his thing.  With BatBoy, I get to be an observer of his learning.

The Little Things

Most of what we do when it comes to learning math is not blog material. Not every task contains an 'ah-ha!' moment; not every activity is new or surprising. This post lays out some of the little things we do to support mathematical thinking and learning, and some things that we don't do yet, but are in the works.

Jumping Number Line

A few weeks ago, a good friend of mine introduced me to an iPad/iPhone app called Motion Math Zoom.  This game is a highly visual, intuitive exploration of the number line.  With help from cute animal pictures, the player gets a good sense of scale when looking at pieces of the line, marked off by ones, tens, hundreds, thousands, thousandths, hundredths, and tenths.  The scale can be changed with a simple finger pinch.

I was impressed with this game, and a little sad that it didn't include fractions in fraction form. So one day, needing the kids to have something to do while I cooked dinner, I used masking tape to mark off a number line along the tiles on our kitchen/dining room floor.