By Kristen Acosta

Did you know that mathematics can be a very visual subject? People rely on their vision to make sense and understand the world around them. We can assist all of our students to make sense of mathematics by using images that illustrate and intrigue.

Pictures and images play an important role in a child’s growing development. Pictures can stir creativity or evoke an emotion. Pictures can start conversations. Pictures can tap into a person’s background knowledge when an image ignites curiosity .  

Using pictures to have a math conversation with students is an easy way to engage students in math and make math accessible to all students. Math isn’t a subject that is purely in a textbook. Math isn’t about algorithms or shortcuts. Math is about seeing patterns and applying what we know to what is seen.

Look at the picture of the stacks of coins. Ask yourself “What do you notice? What do you wonder?” (Your brain is now making sense of what you are looking at.)

Picture courtesy of Kristen Acosta

A few things that you might notice:

• There are four different stacks of coins
• There are quarters, pennies, nickels, and dimes
• Each stack of coins appears to be the same height.

 A few things that you might wonder:

• How many quarters, pennies, nickels, or dimes are there?
• Which stack has the most money?
• How much money is there all together?

After asking what my students are noticing and wondering, I might ask “how much money is in each stack?” The next follow up question, how do you know, is the most important because this will give the teacher an idea of the various strategies students are using to calculate the amount. Students  may just add up each coin’s value in a given stack. They also might multiply the coin’s value with the number of coins in the stack.  

An extension of this idea might be to use this same image for division as well. Using the coins in the picture, is there a way to make equal stacks of coins worth the same amount of money?

Utilizing pictures in your math lessons is a wonderful way to not only engage your students, but help them develop number sense. You will be amazed at the conversation that will get started because every child will have something to say. Most importantly, you are making math an active subject that takes math out of a textbook and into everyday life.      

For more addition resources:  Edutopia Article Website