Math!!!

Today was day number 60 in kindergarten!!  We enjoy counting the days of school each day in our Daily Math Routine which is lead by our Special Helper.  Last week we started counting by 10s and then counting on until we reach our daily number.  Ask your kindergartener how we do our "finger flashing" as we count by tens, "freeze", and then "count on by ones".  They are really good at it!!

Over the past couple weeks your child has brought home some paper manipulatives (green triangles,blue parallellograms, plus and minus symbols on green, and coin strips) from our math series to be used at home to practice work that we've done at school.  These manipulatives go along with the purple number tiles and the red/blue square inch tiles that came home earlier in the year.  See the photos below for how to have your child arrange their manipulatives on a cookie sheet, work tray, or even on a piece of paper.

The kids start out by arranging their numbers 1 through 10 across the top from left to right.  Their other manipulatives should be down at the bottom out of the way.  Use the coins, the green and blue shapes, or the red and blue square inch tiles in the same way at different times to change it up a bit.  When doing these activities we tie it into "5 groups" to help the children see, for instance that "7 is 5 plus 2 more" AND that we can show this with our fingers, with the groups of objects on the tray, and with number partners (5 + 2).