Number sense is the foundation for mathematical learning, and using math puzzles for fun helps learners see the joy in mathematics in addition to helping build their number sense. For students to develop an understanding of math concepts, flexible and fluent thinking with numbers is necessary.
Get this Freebie of 71 Math Number Puzzles delivered to your inbox to use with your students. Providing opportunities to do math puzzles daily is one way to help students develop their number sense. CLICK Here to sign up for 71 Math Number Puzzles, and check out my website for more resources I use.
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After this crazy past year of teaching, I reflected on what my students needed most for the upcoming school year. We focused on getting concepts covered and missed opportunities to share our strategies and have fun with math. I decided we needed to go back to building the foundation and developing our number sense. So what does that mean, and how was I going to incorporate this into my math lessons?
What is Number Sense in Mathematics?
Number sense refers to a person’s understanding of number concepts, operations, and applications of numbers and operations. Number sense is flexible thinking and intuition about numbers.
It is the ability to be flexible with numbers and have a variety of strategies to use. Students know how to use the strategy and how to adapt them to meet different situations.
When Does it Develop?
We are born with a sense of numbers. It develops gradually over time and at different rates by exploring numbers, visualizing them in different situations, and relating them to other cases. Number sense develops over time through opportunities to explore and play with numbers. Using math puzzles for fun is a great way to build number sense.
The Importance of Number Sense
It is so important for young mathematicians because it promotes confidence and encourages flexible thinking. In addition, It allows young children to create a relationship with numbers and be able to talk about math.
Good number sense helps children manipulate numbers to make calculations more accessible and gives them the confidence to be flexible in their approach to solving problems.
Mastery of number facts will develop as students increase their number sense. As students learn their facts, they are able to extend their mathematical thinking to larger numbers and more complex computations.
Number sense develops when students connect numbers to their own real-life experiences.
Characteristics of Children with Strong Number Sense
Number sense is much more than writing numerals, counting objects, memorizing, and following steps to solve number problems. Children who develop number sense can assess how reasonable an answer is. They look for connections and patterns in numbers, which help them estimate answers. In addition, they have several strategies for solving problems and can adapt them to new situations. And they think flexibly and fluently about numbers.
They can:
- Take numbers apart and put them back together in different ways
- Mentally Compute
- Visualize and make connections between numbers
- Make real-world connections
- Explain their thinking about numbers
Characteristics of Children with Weak Number Sense
Children with poor number sense tend to focus on procedures. They apply inefficient strategies and fail to see connections to get them to the answer more efficiently. They are reluctant to estimate an answer before working it out and generally accept whatever response they get, regardless of whether it makes sense.
Children with poor number sense don’t enjoy math and do not see the beauty in mathematics. Instead, they rely upon remembering and applying procedures with little understanding of the concepts. In addition, they are not able to adapt or make connections to more efficient strategies.
How to Build Number Sense
Children with good number sense enjoy playing with and exploring numbers.
- Estimate
- Model numbers in different ways
- Make connections
- Number sense math games
- Solve problems mentally
- Student Discourse
Estimate
Providing opportunities to estimate makes the connection between quantity and numbers. For example, you could have a jar of candy and ask your students to estimate how many candies are in the jar.
Encouraging students to estimate before solving a problem also helps students check the reasonableness of an answer. Does my answer make sense? Is it reasonable? When students come up with a crazy solution that doesn’t make any sense, you realize they don’t understand what the numbers mean.
Model Numbers in Different Ways
Putting numbers together and taking them apart (composing and decomposing numbers) in different ways is another way to help students become flexible in their thinking. I use this Compose and Decompose Numbers resource with my younger students to warm up each day to help with this. I have sets for different seasons and holidays to change it up. Having students solve problems in different ways and then sharing their different strategies allows students to learn from each other.
There’s more than one way to solve math problems, and kids should learn different strategies to increase their number sense. Asking students to solve a problem in more than one way or encouraging them to use a particular approach helps them try new ways to solve problems.
Make Connections
Using the concrete, representational, and approach (CRA) approach helps students visualize the learning. Starting with concrete, hands-on experiences, then pictorial representations, and finally, abstract experiences build the conceptual understanding of skills. Students take these ideas and create connections between strategies and concepts.
Teaching kids multiple ways to solve problems exposes students to strategies that they may not have considered. In addition, having students share their strategies fosters a positive math climate and builds number sense.
Number Sense Math Games
Talking, playing, and solving math throughout the day- not just during math class builds number sense and the love of mathematics.
The 24 Game website had math puzzles for fun to introduce to students.
Math Dice by ThinkFun has students roll the three scoring dice and combine addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division to build an equation that is closest or equal to the target.
Sign up to get this Freebie of 71 Math Puzzles for fun to use with your students. These are great for warm-up, whole class, small group, or independent work. You can also print and put the puzzles up on a bulletin board. Then, have strips of paper for students to write down their answers. It is a great early-finisher activity and allows students to see math as fun.
Mental Math
Having students solve problems mentally encourages them to develop mental math strategies. These strategies focus on different ways to break down math problems to make difficult problems easy to solve mentally.
Mental math is also so important to connect to real-world situations where we need to use mental math to figure out problems.
Student Discourse
Look for opportunities for students to talk with each other. Students learn from talking and listening to each other. Develop rich questions that guide them toward learning and thinking about the problem.
Opportunities to share strategies teach students new strategies and provide opportunities for them to explain their thinking.
You will need to set up some structures to help facilitate these discussions, but once the students get used to it, you will be amazed at the learning.
How To Monitor Number Sense in Students?
By creating a list of the skills you are looking for during a lesson and then using a checklist or cruising clipboard, you can keep track of students’ understanding.
Then, you can take this information and help guide discussions towards more efficient strategies or model your thinking to help students. The data collected can also be used to form small groups that focus on certain strategies.
Additional Resources:
Number Sense in Your Classroom
Number sense is a person’s ability to understand, relate, and connect numbers. It is the ability to use this understanding of numbers in flexible ways and develop practical, efficient strategies.
Teachers can promote number sense by providing rich mathematical tasks and encouraging students to make connections to their own experiences and previous learning.
Sign up on my webpage to get this Freebie of 71 Math Number Puzzles delivered to your inbox to use with your students. Providing opportunities to do math puzzles daily is one way to help students develop their number sense. CLICK Here to sign up for 71 Math Number Puzzles and check out my website.
Strong number sense helps build a foundation for mathematical understanding. Focusing on number sense in the younger grades helps build the foundation necessary to compute and solve more complex problems in older grades. Creating a love for math in your children begins with building an understanding of numbers.
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