Why Every Teacher Who Teaches Elementary Math Should Have A Big Container of Beads!

Beads, beads, beads-what can't you do with beads? I think that beads are one of the most versatile manipulatives you can use in math for the early years-and, given the latest research on gender gaps in math and science, it doesn't hurt that beads also (usually) cater to (and hold) the interest of girls while allowing them to explore the nature of mathematics and numeracy in general. I acquired a humongous bead set from a friend and promptly went home to devise a series of lessons around using beads. We started with patterns and pattern recognition-in the form of making bracelets and necklaces for various friends, neighbours and stuffed animals-but they quickly grew bored as they apparently had mastered the art of pattern recognition long ago.

So we moved on to grouping, multiplication and division-the meat of the wonder that beads can do! For the littlest one, we first found a group of beads that were her "favourite ones" and then started with grouping them into groups of 2-10, which quickly progressed to addition and subtraction using them as manipulatives;

For my littlest one, she is quite comfortable adding 2 numbers but is still at the point where she must count every one in order to sum. We are progressing towards the recognition of addition as the concept of adding more to a finite number. In other words, we are working away from 4 + 4 is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, towards 4 + 4 is 4 plus 4 more...i.e. start at 4 and then add 5, 6, 7, 8.

As for the bigger one, he is comfortably unaware that he is beginning memorizing his times tables simply through constant reinforcement and is at the point where he can take a "question" and use his memorization until he gets to a point he does not immediately know and then figure out the rest of the way by counting up. So I figured it was time to formally introduce the concept of division. We talked about how to split things up fairly as I introduced the mathematical symbols associated with the process of dividing. He was able to answer some questions without any "thinking time" so to speak, and commented briefly that he was just grouping backwards...good enough for me!

I always try my best to have a continuous "theme" or at the very least, continuous use of manipulatives, running whenever I can (see my post on discontinuity and fragmentation in the school system for more thoughts on this http://canadianhomeschooler.blogspot.ca/2013/09/discontinuity-fragmentation-and.html), and in this case I will be using beads through patterning, multiplication, division, addition and subtraction for the biggest one and patterning, grouping, addition and subtraction for the littlest one. I like the idea of incorporating them into different aspects of the curriculum-currently I am thinking of using them as an art medium somehow, and possibly tying in some history of beads/jewellery but haven't really flushed out a lesson just yet. What I do know is that within those lessons there is guaranteed to be some sort of mathematical reinforcement snuck in there somewhere-and if anyone has any great lessons using beads, please send them my way!