Introducing The Small Bead Frame

First Presentation: Three Period Lesson

Individual

Materials

  • The small bead frame
  • One from each category of the golden bead material.

Presentation

Give a 3-period lesson, explaining that each green bead stands for one unit, blue bead for one ten, red bead for one hundred, and a green bead in another position for one thousand.

First Exercise: Counting and Recording

Material

  • Small Bead Paper
  • Small Bead Frame

Exercise

  1. Take a piece of the prepared lined paper and explain the lines to the child. ‘We are now going to count the beads and record them as we go along.
  2. Slide one green bead across and mark “1″ on the units’ line.
  3. Slide across the next green bead and put “2″ underneath “1”, and so on, up to 9.
  4. When you come to the 10th green bead-What are ten units the šame as … One ten, so we slide all the green beads back, and bring across a blue bead, and mark “1” on the blue tens line’.

This early exercise can be done before any addition or subtraction has been introduced.

(The exercise with the Divided Mat may be done here.)

Third Exercise: Changing Columns

Changing columns, i.e. expressing a number in as many different ways as possible.

Direct Aim: It gives the child a clear concept of the relationship between units, tens, hundreds and thousands.

Exercise

  1. Ask a child to express a number on the frame in as many ways as he can: 1,000 can be expressed as 9 hundreds, 9 tens, and 10 units-9 hundreds and ten tens, and so on.
  2. Give the child plenty of examples to do.

Fourth Exercise: Making and recording numbers.

Direct Aim: When making numbers, e.g. 6035, the nothingness of zero is very clear, because there will be no beads to the right on the third wire. When the child uses unruled paper (or the undivided mat) with the abacus, his idea of zero will be further enriched. He will now see that zero is necessary in order to indicate the position of a numeral.

Exercise

  1. Making of numbers, which he may record, e.g.36, 930, 763, 6035. Also he can choose beads at random, count, see what number they have made, and record it.
  2. The child may now be given dictation – writing down numbers on ruled paper – without the help of the frame.

Fifth Exercise: Two Bead Numbers

Using only 2 beads, make as many different numbers as possible.

Direct Aim: To assist the child with forming numbers with greater dexterity.

Exercise

  1. Using only 2 beads, and any 2, make as many different numbers as possible, e.g.2,20,200,2,000-11,110,101,etc.
  2. Now use 3 beads, 4 beads, etc.
  3. The child records his work.

Sixth Exercise: Largest/smallest number with 3 figures

Given 3 symbols written vertically, the child makes the largest number he can from them (or the smallest).

Direct Aim: To assist the child in writing large numbers with facility.

Exercise

Write down (3) symbols vertically in the child’s book in the following way:       4

     9

     3

and ask the child what is the largest number he can make with those figures? or the smallest. He uses the bead frame if necessary to find his answer.

Seventh Exercise

Materials

  • Cards with 16 tens and 16 hundreds
  • The small bead frame

Exercise

  1. Give the child prepared slips with, e.g. 18 tens, 7 hundreds on them.
  2. Ask him to make these numbers on the bead frame
  3. Record these using mathematical symbols. Here the last material is given to help the performance with the three operations-addition, subtraction, short multiplication. Through his activity with this frame, the child is now prepared to work the operations in the abstract with full understanding.

Note: Always when the child is working sums in his book encourage him to estimate his answer–this will be a rough control of error for the correct answer. He should start estimating as soon as he writes them down.