Who is asking: Teacher
Level: Elementary

Question:
I work in a Section 27 classroom with various grades. I am looking for assistance on how to deliver a lesson on place value:decimal numbers keeping in mind that they need to see it(visual ) to comprehend. I am looking for grade 4-6 level. Thanks Reg

Hi Reg
It is my opinion that the best materials for place value (whole numbers and decimals) are the Base 10 materials. For whole numbers the students can use the 1's, 10's, 100's and maybe 1000's and can easily see how addition and subtraction work. They can also use the materials as an introduction to mult and div. The same is true for decimals. You can define the 100's flat as having a value of 1 and then the 10's rod has a value of 0.1 and the 1's square has a value of 0.01. There are lots of resources available to support the use of the Base 10 materials and if you want to go back to the original source you can find a book by Zoltan Dienes who was at the U of Sherbrooke. He used the ideas for all bases (not just base 10) and the materials he used were nicknamed Dienes Blocks. I'm glad that you aren't just trying the "drill and kill" approach.

Jack