Reflections on Number Sense in Elementary: Seeing the Math in Action with Carole Fullerton

I was given the opportunity to attend Carole Fullerton’s session “From Skip Counting to Multiplication: Building the Big Math Ideas.”  One of the first ideas that Carole communicated was the importance of teaching through problem solving to invite and include all learners. As she shared a variety of activities, she explained how as teachers, we can differentiate by using good questions.  One example was to ask questions at a variety of levels such as, “How many wheels on 8 trikes? 4 trikes? 16 trikes?” and then to tell our students to pick the problem that is right for them.

She explained the importance of gaining a good understanding of subitizing, skip counting and patterning in the early years to build a solid foundation for students to begin multiplication and division. She gave examples of prompts for good questions and how to use real world examples with our students such as asking what comes in 2s and what comes in 3s? And how can you use the one hundred chart to help you?

The next part of the morning involved an actual Grade 3 class from Pembina Trails School Division being brought into the room to see Carole in action as a teacher. She demonstrated a real-life, hands-on lesson that began with a story about her mom who is a quilter. The question was, “She had 12 quilt squares. What kind of quilt can she make?”  This simple story and question became an introduction-to-multiplication lesson that had the students writing, drawing, building, thinking, and exploring ideas for the quilt the entire time. As observers of her lesson, we were also able to interact with the students to ask them questions and to observe their learning.

Lastly, the day involved learning about the daunting (to me anyway!) Cuisenaire rods.  Never again will I avoid using these magical math manipulatives.  Carole gave us a rundown on their history and invention in 1945 by Belgian teacher Georges Cuisenaire and how important they can be as tools in both early and middle years classrooms.  These colourful blocks can be used for a variety of math explorations including measuring, fractions, addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.

Carole Fullerton is a tell it like it is, humorous, and most of all extremely knowledgeable math expert whose wealth of knowledge and experience is an asset to all math teachers, Canada and beyond! It was a day of learning and reflection that I will use for the rest of my teaching career. Thank you to ASCD for bringing Carole Fullerton to Manitoba!

About The Author

Deanna Matthys is a Grade 3/4 Teacher at Parc La Salle School in the Seine River School Division