Week 1: Place Value Blocks
Good evening! Welcome to the first entry of my Personal Learning Path. Today is Tuesday, September 5th – the day before the first day of school in my district!
This year, I will be working with an amazing group of 4th Grade students. Reflecting on my time in elementary school, 4th Grade was when I was most challenged as a math student, but it was also when I felt most confident as a young mathematician!
Since then, I have never viewed myself as a “math guy,” but this year, I am hoping that will finally change! This is why I will be dedicating this term to rediscovering my love for math by tracking my classroom’s ongoing journey in the subject on my blog!
My goal here is to unearth new ways of framing math as a subject for students who – like me – either lost their confidence, or found it endlessly challenging. If math can be framed differently for those students so that they will be incentivized to problem solve, find the unknown, and maybe even view it as an art, then I will have succeeded as their teacher.
This week, our class will be reviewing place values and rounding numbers. We are also focusing on adding and subtracting both three-digit and double-digit numbers.
For example, the below question visualizes the number 2, 923 in three different ways. Students must use their knowledge of place values (thousands, hundreds, tens, and ones) to determine which option is correct.
Students may do this by counting the first row or column of blocks -- there are 10 across and up and down.
If that's the case, then one sheet of blocks is worth 100. When placed together 10 times, it is 1,000. So, two of those cubed blocks are worth 2,000.
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