Math

Math Philosophy and Terms to Know

The Montessori math materials are perhaps some of the most inviting and beautiful works in the Montessori classroom. Visitors to any Montessori classroom, young and old alike, gravitate to the math shelves, wanting to touch and learn how to use the materials. “What’s this?. How does this teach me division?” they ask. Adults usually sigh and wistfully say, “I wish I had learned math this way”.

The inquisitiveness of the upper elementary Montessori student is astonishing. They dive into the study of fractions and decimals, eager to move beyond to more complex mathematics, geometry, and algebra. While the concrete materials are still in place, the need for repetition is gone. “Show me. Then, show me more” is the litany of the upper elementary Montessori math students. Upper elementary students move quickly from concrete experience to abstract thought. They are eager to test their knowledge with pencil and paper and need, at times, a gentle reminder to return to the materials as a way of building neurological pathways.

While we get to use the Montessori materials as much as possible, we also have the Common Core Math standards to teach our students. The Common Core standards focus heavily on problem-solving and word problems. Problem-solving is a huge component of math and especially the new Common Core standards. We use a 3-, 4-, and sometimes 5-prong approach to cover problem-solving in our classroom. We use the following items:

180 Days of Problem Solving. These are broken up into weekly themes Day 1 is focusing on how to read a word problem. Day 2 has the students solve the word problem from Day 1 and 1 more problem. They must show with visual representation and explain the answer. Day 3 asked them to use a visual representation to solve a problem. Day 4 asks them to solve the same problem 2 different ways. Day 5 is a challenge with a multiple-step problem that makes them think critically to solve.
180 Days of Math. Each day has 10 mini problems ranging from fact families, place value, arrays, basic facts, reading a thermometer, measurement, and more. A way to keep our brains engaged and remember the math concepts taught to them.
Logic and Critical Thinking: Occasionally we will throw in a Logic problem and/or a Sudoku puzzle to make their brains think about things in a different way. It’s tough for the kids at first, but as the year progresses, we usually have kids begging for more logic and Sudoku puzzles to be on the work plan or available for them when they finish their work. It’s things like this that prepare our students to be innovators that think outside the box in the outside world!
Math Journal Sticker: The Common Core mathematical problem-solving criteria expect kids to be able to solve a word problem, show, explain and justify how they were able to get their answer. Kids have learned to vary quickly in our class, different students can get the same answer on a problem but come about the answer in completely different ways. We highly encourage them to share their success with others and explain (as if they were a teacher) how they got their answer. These Math Journal stickers are a way to visually represent this process with pictures, patterns, and paragraphs, interactive Math Journals. This is something new that I have been researching over the summer that I plan to implement this school year. Montessori is very hands-on and the lessons involve the students manipulating and doing things. Over the years I have noticed that some kids are great at visually remembering the steps they just performed and can do it on their next assignment or months later on their own. There are other students that need a refresher occasionally, or almost daily. To help all students out, we will be keeping a math journal with the notes we take from our lessons, with charts, graphs, and other things to help us remember how to do a math concept. It will be a great resource that the students can pull out and use throughout the year and in years to come.
We also use the digital curriculum of IXL. It’s an online math program that we use as a school. We set up assessments and they test kids based on the Common Core standards. We get the results immediately and it gives us to target areas for the kids to work on. We can also set up customized courses for the kids to do. We will be requiring a certain number of minutes to be completed each week. This is something they can do at school and also at home. We also utilize Scootpad for Math. It will place the kids into certain units for them to master.

HELP! My child is bringing home their math and I have no clue how to help them!

We have heard it a lot over the years about the Montessori math materials and even more so since Common Core came into existence..."How do I help my child with their math?" "This is a foreign concept to me" "How can I support their math but in a Montessori way?" We have gone to Youtube to find some very interesting and educational videos to share with you about some of these math concepts that you may need to help your child with.

Montessori-Based Math Videos:

Montessori Stamp Addition: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=11uFgXLoe4g

Montessori Stamp Subtraction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR_585byoUw

Stamp Multiply: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NHeljvTuxQg

Stamp Division: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4MXJQH9BHo

Checkerboard multiplication https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7QdsQ1BGuk

Improper to mixed Montessori: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuohREU7ZUQ

Fractions +/- unlike: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sF-wsIhAqfA

Common Core Based Math Videos:

Box Multiplication: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUvOyz2Ysq0

Box Division: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hp6JiFQApZM

Lattice Multiplication: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6maCFqpbI0