Once students can play the Fair Trades DOWN game with Fair Lands™ blocks, Ten Land blocks, and/or counters, they are ready to learn how to export, or subtract, in Fair Lands™. The instructional sequence is (1) export with no recording, (2) export and record just the answer, and (3) export and record the answer and all trades column by column. Examples of each step in Two Land from the Fair Lands™ importing and exporting e-book are given below.
(1) Export in Two Land, no recording (because the answer is given), ,
(2) Export in Two Land, record just the answer, ,
(3) Export in Two Land, record the answer and all trades column by column, ,
The final step—recording the answer and all trades column by column—models the standard algorithm for subtraction. When children can record trading down column by column in any land, then doing so in Ten Land (base 10) becomes just like what they have been doing in other lands (bases) except for the number 10, and you can announce that henceforth, all subtraction will be in Ten Land (base 10), and in a single day, with only a few examples showing how the algorithm models how the children have been thinking when exporting in different lands, you will be able to teach subtraction effectively, the first time, to every child.
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IMPORTANT! Do NOT teach the shortcut of sticking 1s about when “borrowing” as is customary in using the standard subtraction algorithm. Doing so causes difficulty in subtracting fractions. The following illustrates a common error in subtracting fractions that persists into adulthood:
WRONG! |
Right |
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Why do America’s Students Rank So Poorly in Math in International Testing?
Most teachers take their jobs seriously and care that their students learn. Why, then, for decades, have America’s students ranked near the bottom in math in international testing? To learn who is to blame, click . You will be glad you did.
Two reasons, in particular, account for the overall poor performance of most American students in math. One is time-honored (thus passionately preserved) math lessons in
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Think Links™ Whole Numbers
Maintenance activities on addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division of whole numbers in a game-like format. Hundreds of solved problems in the activities themselves. Includes calculator exercises.
Grades 1-4, 57 pages of reproducible black-line masters with permission to duplicate.
Available only from this website.