Counting to twenty is not the same as knowing what twenty means. In this LiveTalk Maren Schmidt looks at how young children actually build number sense, and how much of it happens long before the first math lesson. She starts with five common misconceptions about math, then shows how the sensorial materials (the pink tower, the red rods, the knobbed cylinders) quietly prepare a child’s mathematical mind, and where those materials came from: the butcher’s weights, the apothecary’s cylinders, the spindles once used for spinning wool.
You will also hear why the numbers to ten matter more than anything that comes after, the three words adults mix up without noticing (numeral, number, quantity), what opens up once a child has ten firmly in hand, and how to tell number stories from an ordinary day. In the Q&A Maren shows how to make counting trains from craft sticks and spindle boxes from one-dollar containers, how to tell a child is ready for the golden beads, and her favourite ways into fractions: cooking together and the book Picture Pie. Her one takeaway for parents: get to ten, and don’t rush.
In this video
For parents and teachers of children from 3 to 6 who'd like to support math at home, Maren Schmidt starts with five common myths about math. The talk shows how materials like the pink tower, a set of stacking cubes, build a sense of number, and what comes after 10. Math stories and big story problems for older kids, like doubling germs, get their own chapters. The Q&A covers counting songs, place value, homemade math materials and fractions while cooking.
Chapters
- 0:00 What math really is and five common myths about it
- 7:21 How the pink tower and other materials build number sense
- 13:48 Numbers to 10 with spindle boxes, and what zero means
- 18:40 After 10: the decimal system, teens, tens and operations
- 25:40 Seeing patterns in the materials and telling math stories
- 28:58 Big story problems for older kids, like doubling germs
- 34:55 Stories of famous mathematicians and the story of numbers
- 39:23 Q&A: counting songs, and teaching place value after 10
- 43:18 Q&A: when to start golden beads and homemade math materials
- 48:04 Q&A: fractions by cooking, and why getting to 10 comes first
