by Carrie Moritz, Gazette
This year's Kindergarten through 5th grade Garretson Elementary students are learning and playing with math in a whole new way. In August, a new curriculum named "Investigations" was introduced to the students, which incorporates hands-on and spiral learning to ensure understanding of the sometimes-difficult subject.
As first-grade teachers Jill Whalen and Amber Schroeder looked back at the first 100 days of the math curriculum, both said they and their students have enjoyed it immensely.
Curriculum is a standardized way of introducing and helping students study subjects, allowing them to achieve proficiency and learning skills.
Investigations, like the "Sonday System" curriculum that has been successfully used with reading at Garretson Elementary, uses spiral review, a way of consistently reviewing past information while introducing new ideas and concepts. The teachers said both Sonday and Investigations introduce 1-3 new skills each week.
"We're continuing to practice skills we've already learned on top of learning new skills," said Schroeder. "Our Investigations is very hands on, and our students learn a lot through playing games...they really enjoy that."
The system is also very interactive for students, which encourages critical thinking and problem solving. Because it's so hands on, they explore their environment and are able to connect the real world to the subject.
"It allows them to work with other students, so they work a lot on those social skills, but they are also able to share with each other different ways of finding how they came up with the answer," said Schroeder.
"You see them coming up with their own ways and their own ideas," said Whalen. "You teach them a certain way, but then they're able to take what you've taught them and build their own strategies." Both teachers like the way it encourages students to problem solve and adapt the information to their own learning style.
Each unit begins with teachers introducing the concepts and games that will be used, modeling its uses and examples, then splits the students into groups to practice the concept. Investigations, especially in first grade, uses a "slow release" model. This means it slowly reduces the amount of time the students spend listening to the teacher, and increases the time they spend interacting with the subject on their own as they master it.
While most adults don't need to consider these concepts consciously, it's important that they be intentionally introduced in first grade to establish students' foundational learning. The South Dakota standards for first grade math want instruction time to focus on developing 1) an understanding of addition, subtraction and strategies for getting to 20, 2) understanding place value, including ten's and one's, 3) understanding linear measurement and their units, and 4) understanding geometric shapes.
The game aspect of the curriculum has been the most popular. For instance, the first graders were recently playing with a 100's number chart. Students would cover five numbers, and another student would have to figure out which five were missing.
"This is counting, but some of the kids caught on to [patterns]," said Whalen. They were, in essence, teaching themselves how to count by 10's and 2's. "It seems like such a basic [thing], but they ended up teaching themselves some skills."
Counting to 120, and extending the counting sequence, is a part of the South Dakota standards for first grade. Understanding the patterns of counting by 2, 5, and 10 helps students with addition, subtraction, and in the future, multiplication and division.
Manipulatives, or objects that help abstract ideas become concrete such as dice, shapes, small toys, and blocks, are popular among first grade students.
Currently, the first grade classes are learning lengths and measurements, both standard and non-standard, and the concept of time and how to measure that. Students were first taught non-standard measurement units using paperclips, blocks, and strings to introduce the subject.
Schroeder recounted a fun game with string that had been used the week before last. The students were given a string, and they used it to measure items, seeing if they were longer or shorter than the string. This allowed them to connect the concept of measurements to real items, which then allowed the teachers to introduce a ruler and the concepts of inches and feet.
"They were all over, measuring all the things in here," said Schroeder. The students would share with each other what they were finding, encouraging their classmates to continue exploring.
It may not seem complex, but to a 7-year-old, these are new ideas their brains have only recently developed enough for. A 2021 study in Dev Sci found that math abilities are highly impacted by reading ability, which first grade students make big strides in.
For their part, the teachers have enjoyed the well-laid-out curriculum, and love seeing the students develop independence in learning.
"It is a fun grade," Whalen said. "You see so much growth in first grade. I loved [teaching] kindergarten, but you see them grow, especially in reading...it's a big academic growth year."
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