Ensuring that your upper elementary students have a strong number sense is the key to helping them be successful in upper elementary math. Read that last sentence again and really think about it! The number sense developed in students between Kindergarten-2nd grade impacts how students do with upper elementary math. As an upper elementary teacher, I rely on the lower elementary teachers to give my students a strong foundation with number sense. What happens when that doesn’t happen or something like, a pandemic, impacts a students number sense foundation? Do we keep moving on and hope that someday students will have that strong number sense OR do we add more review and foundational math practice into our classrooms? I think the 2nd one sounds better. What do you think?
Instead of going back and “teaching” the standards from Kindergarten-2nd grade, I found that incorporating more number sense/ place value activities was the key for my students. This is why my favorite unit to the start the year off with was place value. By doing this, I helped my students build on the number sense they already had and reactivate the number sense from previous years. Today, I am going to share with you my top 5 tips for teaching and reviewing place value to help build a stronger number sense. Spoiler: These tips are easy to implement and there may even be a few FREEBIES!
- Start with review of what students should know! I often find that what I think my students should know about place value is not always true, or they need some retrieval of their place value knowledge. I like to use retrieval activities, like the Brain Dump, to see what my students know and what we need to review. Click here to read an article from EducationWeek with some different retrieval activities, including the Brain Dump.
- Make sure you spend time on vocabulary review! Over the years, I have found that many of my students come to 4th grade with a confusion on the value and place of a number. After I find out what they already know, I always spend a good amount of time going over vocabulary and making sure my students have an understanding before jumping into any new place value learning. I like to use fill in the blank vocabulary charts that are interactive.
- Use manipulative and hands on activities! I have found that these are the key to making sure my students have a strong understanding of place value. I pull out base ten blocks and place value charts on day 1 of our place value unit and always make sure they are available to my students throughout our unit. Click here to grab my place value charts for FREE!
- Make sure you are checking in on students understanding of place value throughout your whole unit! It is so discouraging to get to the end of your place value unit and have students not do as well on the end of unit assessment, because you missed that there were areas of place value that your students needed additional practice. I started using place value quizzes or exit tickets throughout our unit to help with this. I found by doing this, my students did a lot better on that end of unit assessment and I understood more what we needed to spend more time on.
- Make sure you spend PLENTY of time on reading and writing numbers! This may seem obvious, but I found that my first couple of years in upper elementary, I was not doing this enough and I would have to have many conversations, or even a mini-lesson, in the middle of the year on how to read a number.
Are you a 4th grade teacher? If so, I have GREAT news for you! I have created a unit that incorporates all these tips and gives you a bunch of activities to help your students practice place value at a great value. Click the button below to check out this unit today!
