Welcome. This course begins by rebuilding a dependable picture of number, not by asking you to race through facts. A number is evidence about a quantity: something you can organize, check, explain, and represent in more than one way.
MATH-101 · MODULE 01
Foundations of Early Numeracy
Build reliable quantity, counting, numeral, and zero ideas through ten.
A five-hour foundations course
Build number ideas you can see, say, check, and use.
These lessons are deliberately paced. Start with the welcome dialogue, work through the visible model and guide thinking in each cycle, then use the practice question as a check—not as the lesson itself.
Restoring this module…
Before you begin
Guided conversation
In this module, you will work with small collections, marks, frames, fingers, and numerals from 0 through 10. You will learn why touching or marking one item for each count word matters, why the last number word tells the total, and why zero is a real number that describes an empty collection.
Each section starts with a question you can notice before you answer. Then you will see a model, try a connected task, and explain what convinced you. If a count goes wrong, the next screen helps you find whether something was skipped, counted twice, or simply arranged in a distracting way. That information guides the next example; it is not a grade on you.
Notice
Notice a quantity before counting
Learning target
Use a quick estimate as a starting idea, then check it carefully.
Teach the idea
Before you count, let your eyes take in the whole set. A quick prediction is not a test of speed; it gives you a number to check. When a set is arranged in a familiar pattern, you may recognize some at once. When it is not, you can still count deliberately.
See the model
Model: • • • • • is a set of five dots. The spaces do not create the quantity; the dots do.
Guide thinking
Teacher thinking: “I predict about five. Now I will touch each dot once to verify.”
Connected practice
Choose the quantity
How many dots are here: • • • • • • ?
Learner conversation
Pause and explain
Use one of these prompts to explain the idea in your own words. You can keep a private note if that helps you remember a strategy.
- Before you named the total, what did you do to make sure every item had one count word?
- What evidence tells you that this numeral matches this collection, rather than only looking familiar?
- If the same objects are spread farther apart, what stays the same and how could you prove it?