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Lorem Ipsum Dolor Spring 2016
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instructional methods as well as find useful assistive technology.
Dana and Barbara approached an exhibitor table, which was the first
one on the right in the exhibit hall. Barbara began to sign in Dana's hand to
inform her that the math manipulatives for her students
to use were also
available in Braille. With Barbara's assistance, Jim Franklin, an inclusion
special education teacher from Elm Street Elementary in Rome, Georgia and
creator of Slide-A-Round Math Manipulatives, introduced himself and gave
the background information of his math manipulatives.
At the beginning of the 2011-2012 school year, Jim's assistant special
education director asked to observe his 4th grade math inclusion class. He
welcomed the upcoming visit but wondered if any new
strategies/interventions had been successfully implemented by other teachers
with the concept of rounding whole numbers. He asked other math teachers
in his school and searched for ideas on the Internet. He only saw blocks, dry
erase markers and boards, and number lines.
Other than those options,
paper and pencil were the last resort. The last thing he wanted his visitors to
observe were towers being built out of blocks or off-task drawings on dry
erase boards. He could not use a number line for his lesson because the
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