Counting beads on strings
Escola Sadako
Barcelona

Age:
6-7

LESSON 1

Aims:
To become familiar with the concepts of number and quantity.

To identify quantities and their properties.

Materials:
Strings of beads of two different colours(5 of each colour).

Strips of paper with pictures of five yellow circles and five blue circles. ( it is a good idea to plastify the paper strips.

Introduction:
We take a string with ten beads. To learn how to count and to demonstrate the strategies it is best to use a ten-bead neclace with five beads of one colour and five of another colour. The pupil has to visualize and remember that there are five beads of each colour.

Main part:
With our hand we make an imaginary knife to cut the necklace. The pupil has to know how many beads are to the right of the cut and how many beads are on the left. They count the beads. At first, the pupils count the beads one by one, but slowly they begin splitting the fives.

Roundup:
After asking the pupils which strategies they used to count the beads, we come to the conclusion that it is not necessary to count the beads one by one, but that when the beads change colour they can use the number five to continue counting.

 
 
 
  Once we have done the activity we play at placing numbers on the string of beads using a pencil, a clothes peg or our fingers.
   
 

LESSON 2

Aims:
To place numbers in the correct position using string of beads drawn on paper.

Materials:
Sheets of paper with drawings of eight strings of beads.

Main part:
The teacher dictates numbers and the children colour in the correct number of beads and draw a line to represent the magic knife. Then they write the number beside the picture.
 
Observations:
After completing the activity the teacher collects the children's work and corrects them individually. This lets the teacher see if the children can situate the numbers correctly but it does not give any information about the strategies the children use. For this reason it is very important to do more activities like the one explained inn lesson 1.