Stepping it up in Math Workshop

With the use of linking cubes our class has been building staircases. Through building and ordering staircases students see how counting by 1s is a process of adding 1 more. They also begin to see how to start from smallest to biggest as well as biggest to smallest (ascending and descending order). Students worked in pairs to create their staircase masterpieces starting at 1 all the way up to 12.

When all the students were through creating the staircases we walked around the room to observe each groups work. We had each group explain their thinking which helped other students discover different ways of counting. By building on each others thinking the class began to see that there is more than one way to answer a problem. You rock T&R's!