
If your child brings home math work, you may be surprised to see enormous numbers. What’s this all about?
The Montessori Elementary Math materials and practices support the manipulation and comprehension of large numbers. Using large numbers is not the goal, but it happens that Montessori Math enables using large numbers and the reasoning mind and the imagination of the elementary child is drawn to them.
Montessori Elementary Math
The Bank Game, employing the Golden Bead Material, can be used to practice the four basic operations – addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division. This game allows the child to practice exchanging. Children can also practice these operations using the Stamp Game. Both of these materials support sums, products, minuends, and dividends up to the thousands.
The Large Bead Frame supports performing addition, subtraction, and multiplication using numbers up to one million and the Flat Bead Frame and the Checkerboard enable the child to work multiplication problems with products into the hundred millions. If that does not accommodate the products that the children have in mind, they can butt one Checkerboard up to another and access nine additional decimal places (hundred-quadrillions, in case you’re wondering). To work division problems with dividends in the multiple millions, the Racks and Tubes material stands ready. Going in the opposite direction, to astonishingly small numbers, our Decimal Material can accommodate problems with sums, products, minuends, and dividends in the millionths.
The intrigue of enormous numbers is just one fascinating aspect of Montessori Elementary Math. Ask your child what his or her favorite Math material or activity is and why!