Cuisenaire Rods and Base Ten Blocks can be used to represent variables in algebra. This makes it less abstract and young kids are able to understand what would otherwise be completely beyond their math and logic abilities.
My girls have had previous experience with square numbers and I think that helped them to catch on to this quickly. You can see videos of them playing with square numbers in base ten on the Multiplication and Division Concepts page. Or click below…
This time around we started without paper and just used the Cuisenaire Rods. I tried to help my girls see more interesting ways of naming numbers to help develop more number sense and especially to work on fractions skills. This is a great activity to do to help you know where a child is at in their understanding and to help stretch their thinking to more mature ways of viewing numbers. You can work on all sorts of skills. It’s the type of activity that can be done many ways and at many levels!
