Using manipulatives is an important part of learning
mathematics. As a student teacher, I used manipulatives to make sure my
students understood the mathematical concepts in the concrete stage of learning
before moving them to the more abstract stages of learning. Some of the
manipulatives that I used included Base Ten Blocks, Unifix Cubes, and
counters. The children were better able to grasp these concepts by first
using manipulatives.
In these photographs, my students are comparing numbers using
Unifix Cubes.