Wooden Hierarchical Material

Materials
- One piece of each of the following:

• Unit – a green cube 5mm x 5mm x 5mm
• Ten – blue prism with green divisions 5mm x 5mm x 5mm
• Hundred – red prism with blue divisions 5cm x 5cm x 5cm
• Thousand – green cube with red divisions 5cm x 5cm x 5cm
• Ten Thousand – blue prism with green divisions 5cm x 5cm x 5cm
• Hundred thousand – red prism with blue divisions 50cm x 50cm x 50cm
• Million – green cube with red divisions 50cm x 50cm x 50cm

- A set of prepared cards with notation from 1 to 1,000,000


Presentation

1. Have the child unroll two large mats.
2. Help the child to bring over the material and lie it on the mat from smallest to largest.
3. Have the child bring over the Introductory Tray of Beads and place it next to the tray of material a – d (from material list)
4. Compare the gold unit to the green unit, the gold ten with the blue ten, the gold square with the red square and the gold cube with the green cube.
5. Have the child replace the Introductory tray on the shelf.
6. Do a Three Period Lesson with the new material.
7. Introduce material e – g (from the list above).
8. Name them and explain that they represent ten-thousand, hundred thousand and million.
9. Do a Three Period Lesson with all of the material.
10. Once the child is comfortable with all of the new material and their names, show the child the cards for 1 – 1000.
11. Show the child one card at a time and have him give the names of each.
12. Show the child the new cards, one at a time.
13. For 10,000 cover the 10 and have the child count how many zeros there are. Say, “because there are 3 zeros, it is going to be a thousand.”
14. Uncover the 10 and cover the 000. Show the child that this is ten so that makes the number ten-thousand.
15. Repeat in the same manner for hundred thousand.
16. When you show the million card, give the name and have the child count the number of zeros that are in a million.
17. Place the cards in numerical order from largest to smallest in a vertical line on the right side of the mat.
18. Have the child mix all of the material and point to the material randomly, ask the child what it is, and have him place the corresponding card in front of the piece of material.
19. Tell the child that you will now rearrange the material.
20. Place all of the green material in a vertical line, all the red material in a vertical line and so on for all of the material.
    
    
    
21. Look at the difference of each with the child. (This will give the child a Sensorial impression of the great difference of size from the million to the thousand to the unit and so on for each category.)
22. Rearrange the material back into order from million to unit.
23. Have the child place the corresponding card to each.
    
    
    
    
24. Point to the unit, ten, and hundred.
25. Say, “This is the unit, ten, and hundred of simple numbers.”
26. Point to the thousand, ten-thousand, and hundred-thousand.
27. Say, “This is the thousands.”
28. Point to the million and say, “This is the simple unit of millions.”
29. Do a Three Period Lesson with the names of the groups.
30. Superimpose all of the cards and read the number: 1,111,111
31. Have the child replace the material from the million to the 10,000. Have him place the unit to the thousand on the tray.
    

Purpose

Direct
To introduce the child to the hierarchies of the decimal system
beyond one thousand and give a wider understanding of the function of the decimal system.

Control of Error
The directress

Age
5 1/2 - 6 years

Questions, Comments ?

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