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Lorem Ipsum Dolor Spring 2016
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longest one available only went to 100; his class was working with numbers
greater than 100. Although all four options have been used for years and
have had some success, he wanted math manipulatives that could make an
immediate impact on educational performance and not be considered a "toy"
by his students. Then, he had an idea!
Incorporating movable, interchangeable slides, he created a number
line system that can round whole numbers up to 10,000,000. It can round
numbers to the nearest 10, 100, 1,000, 10,000, 100,000, and
1,000,000. When he began to show this concept to his colleagues, the
response was overwhelmingly positive! Teachers began to ask him to help
create manipulatives to address other mathematical standards as well.
Eventually, he developed manipulatives that involve weight, capacity, elapsed
time, decimals/ money, and fractions. During this process, he consulted with
math teachers and specialists, administrators, parents, and students from
several different schools and school systems. He also consulted with an
occupational therapist, a hearing specialist, and vision-impaired specialist. Of
all of the stakeholders with whom he worked throughout the initial part of the
developmental process, he most valued the student input. After all,
they
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