Browsing by Subject "number sense"

Number sense lays the foundation for learning math, and it enables understanding numbers, learning mathematical concepts and skills and development of the strategies needed in solving mathematical problems. The different sections of number sense are the key contents to learn in the 1st grade according to the Core curriculum for basic education (2014). According to previous studies it is vital that child is guided to focus on numerosity. It has also been studied that the majority of Finnish teachers follow the instructions of a teacher's book when teaching math, which gives a clear message that it is important to analyse teacher's books. Mathematical conception should be diverse and create understanding of number sense by using concrete materials, pictures, speech and symbols and connecting math to the context of a child's everyday life. The goal of this thesis is to study how number sense is taught in three 1st grade math textbook series and to analyse how the conception happens in the teacher's books. As the data of this study I used 1st grade teacher's books meant for teaching mathematics called Open Kymppi 1, Tuhattaituri 1 and Opettajan tienviitta that is based on the Varga–Neményi method. All of these series cover the first school year. I studied the books for the whole school year and analysed the data with qualitative content analysis according to categories based on the theoretical framework of the study. I also made a comparison of the different textbook series. The various sections of number sense were taught in all of the teacher's books, but in slightly differing ways and with different emphasis. Counting skills were practised a lot in the teacher's books. Tuhattaituri and Opettajan tienviitta also emphasized learning the decompositions of numbers 1–10. Tienviitta was different from the other books: it trains the focusing on numbers more and the learning of number sense starts of without using numerals. Ordinal numbers were not taught in Open Kymppi. All books deemed concrete and active ways of learning the concept as important. Tuhattaituri and Opettajan tienviitta include plenty of active and playful exercises and conceptualization with concrete material representations. Open Kymppi did not reach to other books level on this.