Meaning in the Making

I had a very interesting conversation with my eight year old over math homework this morning revolving around the commutative property.  Interesting because of her thoughts and also interesting that, for the very first time, I backed away from mathematical correctness, and truly listened to what she had to say. It was fascinating.

The homework asked for factors of various two digit numbers. For 24, my kid put 2x12, 1x24 & 24x1.

I said, "Those last two are the same thing, what other factors can you figure out?"

The response was immediate and somewhat intense. She was convinced that 1x24 and 24x1 were different because that is what the teachers said.

I mentioned we had read about the commutative property in Beast Academy 3B but, sweetly, nothing could sway her loyalty to her teachers and her opinion about what she thought they had taught her.

It was at this point I thought back to all the things Christopher Danielson has written about Cognitively Guided Instruction and the wonderful modeling of his Talking Math with Your Kids project. These approaches show the worth of conversation around math with an emphasis on the adult really listening to what the child is thinking.

She continued. "See! One times twenty four is [pointedly counting] one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve...twenty four.  Twenty four times one is...[pausing, then saying emphatically] twenty four."

I nodded. "Oh, I see what you're thinking. The first way means you have to count by ones 24 times. The second way you just have to say 24 once."

In her mind it's the process of getting to the final answer that makes the two facts different. Never mind that she gets the same answer both ways. Never mind that she knows all about the "twin facts" on multiplication chart. Never mind that we're having fun finding different ways to memorize multiplication facts including sneaky guerrilla tactics. Nope. This is her reality and it's not going to budge by quoting official definitions.

All I said was,"You can put those two facts on the paper, but your teachers may want you to put some others as well."  In the end she found all the factors of 24, but wrote each combination twice (e.g. 6x4 and 4x6).

In the process of writing my new book, tentatively titled Meaning in the Making: The Body Learning Math, I've been doing a lot of reading and thinking about how the processes of doing and learning math are just as important as the product.  In this case, she can easily figure out factors of two digit numbers, but it's by watching her process closely and engaging in conversation about her thinking where we really get a glimpse into what she knows and how she knows it. Specifically, we can see how she is literally making and reasoning out her own meaning of how multiplication facts are combined. 

We only get half of the picture if we look at the final product/answer (double facts). I know how to watch for and identify understanding through the processes of making math and dance at the same time, but now I'm really learning about how it works with numbers, too! Fun stuff.

Look How Our Number Wall Grows!

As a little update to my recent Seeing Numbers post, I wanted to show you what an effect these re-imagined factor trees are having on my child.

Here is the first day, focusing on the factors of 20.  As detailed in the Seeing Numbers post, my seven year old used the tree metaphor wonderfully to illustrate different ways to add and multiply numbers to make 20:

The next day she chose 40.  As before, this tree utilized addition and multiplication as she built its branches.  We also noticed, when we made the preliminary wall of factors with our Cuisenaire rods, that we used the same color rods as when we factored 20, just twice as many.

I had other math things planned for today but this morning she asked, "Can we make another number tree?"  Yes, of course!

We settled on 30 and this is when her understanding of what we were doing really took a jump.  After we created wall of C. rods and after I sketched out all the different factor trees for 30 (like I did both times before) she, unbidden, picked which version she wanted to make.  Huge.  Both times prior to today I walked her through the structure of my own tree (more in line with factoring) but did not define what exactly a number tree should be.  As long as she was composing or decomposing numbers somehow on her tree I was set to be happy which is why I was surprised that she moved over to the factoring camp so quickly.

In her 30 tree her artistic vision is grand but her numbers are tiny, lol!  As we looked at her tree closely she showed me the first level of 5 and 6 branches, and then the additional 2 and 3 branches off the 6.  And, as with the other two trees, she added a crowning flower showing the day's number.

These pictures are all on the wall next to our dining table.  She has been admiring them and examining them closely every time she sits down to a meal at which time we also admire each others handiwork. I have invested in some new markers and paper because I never want this to end!

I will be forever grateful to Simon Gregg and his 5th grade students at Toulouse International School for providing us with such a perfect vehicle for exploring numbers in a way that makes sense to us.  I had been looking for a way to look at and explore numbers that involved an expressive visual element and am excited to see where this will take us. We've grown so much already through the process of observing and using the commutative property with the C. rods, applying understanding of groupings to our design, and conceptualizing division in a completely different, very exciting way.