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Tuesday, August 18, 2020

#MTBoSBLaugust - Subitizing and Recognizing Number Combinations

In working to develop number sense in our second grade students, we spent time on activities that encouraged students to visualize numbers and think about number combinations. We did quick image activities with ten frames, solved Splat! questions (thank you Steve Wyborney!), played Shake and Spill, and conducted other related activities. 

For quick images with ten frames we used both horizontal and vertical sets of ten frame cards. Cards were flashed for 2-3 seconds and then hidden. Students were asked:

  • What number did you see?
  • How did you see it?
  • How many more to 10?
Here's an example of the cards we used.
If you want to try this with your students, you can download a copy of each set of ten frame cards. Click here for the horizontal version. Click here for the vertical version.

Shake and spill is a game we played with two-color counters. Students would take a number of counters (6, for example) in their hands, shake them, and spill them on the desktop. Students then looked at the counters and determined how many of each color without counting. Eventually, the same combinations would keep coming up and students began to recognize that 6 could be made of 0+6. and 1+5, and 2+4, and 3+3, and so on. Once students were familiar with the game, we added in recording sheets. Here's the sheet for 6.
I first learned about Shake and Spill many years ago in an old video series (80s hair and clothes) created by Marilyn Burns. The videos focused on how different manipulatives could be used to teach a range of mathematical ideas. You can read about an updated version of this activity at the Math Solutions site. 

If you want to try this with your students, you can download a PDF file with Shake and Spill for numbers 5-10.

That's it for day 18 of #MTBoSBlaugust. I hope you'll come back tomorrow to see what else I have to share.

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