Your First-Grader and Math
First-graders develop their math skills in a number of ways as they learn about computation, measurement, patterns, shapes, time and money.
In Your Child's Classroom
What math concepts will my first-grader learn?
In first grade, learning in math occurs on many different fronts. Children learn about computation, numbers and number sense, measurement, patterns, shapes, money and telling time.
You will begin to see a dramatic shift in your child's development. He will start to look at the world more logically and will understand cause and effect. When they are younger, children can't readily understand an adult's point of view, but starting at age 6 or so, this changes.
Nicola Salvatico, our consulting teacher and Pennsylvania Teacher of the Year in 2005, explains: "Math in first grade begins to connect the real world to the child's point of view." This shift will certainly play a role in your child's growing knowledge of math as well as allowing many teaching opportunities at home, such as measuring recipe ingredients, counting change or estimating how much time it takes to get from home to your place of destination.
Patterns and shapes
First-graders learn to sort objects by color, shape and function, and to recognize patterns. Your first-grader should be able to sort a mixed group of blocks so that all the red blocks are in one group and all the blue blocks are in another. If blocks are placed on a table in this way — red block, blue block, red block, blue block — your first-grader should be able to predict which color block should come next to continue the pattern as well as creating another pattern with similar features.
First-graders learn to distinguish two-dimensional and three-dimensional geometric shapes such as triangles, squares, cones and cylinders. They will also be able to identify the shapes of items in the classroom or home.
Numbers
By the end of first grade, your child should be able to count to 100 by ones, twos, fives and 10s, and to have a sense of how big the number 100 is. She should also be able to begin counting at any number you choose between 0-100.
She should be able to write the words for the numbers from one to 12. Your child is introduced to the concepts of "more" and "less," and will work with simple graphs through analyzing and creating.
Computation
Your first-grader will work to learn addition and subtraction facts with numbers up to 20. First-graders start moving away from counting objects (or "math manipulatives," as they are called in school), to doing more mental math. Simple word problems are introduced, such as: I have three marbles and give one to my friend; how many do I have left?
Money
First-graders learn about coins and their value. They learn how different combinations of coins can add up to the same amount. There may be a "store" set up in the classroom with a play cash register, play money and objects with price tags, where your child can practice counting money and exchanging items for money.
Measurement
Standard measuring tools, as well as units of measurement, are topics for first-grade math. First-graders will practice measuring using inches, cups and quarts. They learn to read a clock face and tell time to the half-hour.
What to Look for When You Visit
- Simple bar and pictorial graphs on large pieces of paper on display
- Students using "math manipulatives" — blocks, cards, buttons for counting and sorting, as well as students making the transition away from counting and sorting objects to "mental math"
- Calendars and clocks, as first-graders learn about time, days and months, and the concepts of before and after
- Students engaged in measuring objects using measuring cups and rulers
Updated August 2008
More on GreatSchools.net
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- Get Your Child Excited About Math
- Shape Walk
- Find your state's math standards
