Calculators! Who knew such old technology could bring such happiness. While studying about the learning and teaching of mathematics, for my Master's, I read about calculators and how they can help build students' number sense. I was intrigued by this and did a little more study. My experience with calculators, in school, was to try to cheat the system and get the answer without doing much work. Sometimes it worked but usually it didn't. I'm pretty big on teaching number strategies and number sense so I thought it would be fun to get a class set. I wrote a grant and a it was funded. So, my classroom received 30 nice, but simple, calculators. We have used them for counting, spelling (you know 0.1134 upside down.), and lots and lots of calculations. We have raced the calculator while practicing math facts, and it has all be great. But, this past week we started working on SUBTRACTION. It is a pretty intimidating concept for 2nd graders. It takes a lot of work and energy to get the students to practice because it isn't easy. However, if I say, "When you have completed these 6 problems, you can check your answers with the calculator," then everyone hops to work without any complaint. Today students did extra practice problems just so they could use the calculators. This is a joyous moment in the history of my teaching!
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