Howard Schrager

Multiplicando Howard Schrager

During over thirty years of teaching I have seen it confirmed, time and again, that young children have far more of a feeling and imaginative nature than they are little thinkers. The heart is the gateway to a child's mind and the story is the gateway to the heart. In play and in artistic work children integrate their experiences. To be able to learn in a playful, imaginative way, appropriate to their stage of development, cultivates and quickens the children's capacities, and lays the basis for the subsequent development of an intellect imbued with creative force. From the introduction to WORKING WITH LMNOPMultiplicando is a teaching story, an introduction to multiplication in its relation to other mathematical processes. It covers a key piece of the math curriculum, but, perhaps more importantly, it is intended to connect and integrate children's imaginative, physical and feeling life with their math learning experience. If we prove successful we will certainly find the children to have enthusiasm for future math learning. Unlike many stories, Multiplicando is not meant to be read all at once. Ideally it would be told in a series of lessons extending over several weeks, presented in conjunction with movement and artistic activities, as well as practice in the math processes involved. Teaching in this way presents a special opportunity to bring math teaching into the creative realm, with the wealth of potential benefits that this entails. Before beginning to tell the story, please be sure to look in the back of the book where you will find a special section "Using Multiplicando."