You saw last week how excited I was about the Montessori Math Bead Bar Printable Pack Bundle, so just imagine my joy when my colored bead stair arrived on the same day that I finished printing and laminating our set! These two materials work absolutely beautifully together, so I was so excited to put them together with L!
First we built our bead stair on the triangle inset provided on our bead stair hanger. I pointed to the number above each bead bar, named it, then unhooked that bar and counted the beads. Finally, I placed it on the triangle, then did the same with the next number.
L loved each part of the process! She held each bead bar so carefully and placed them just so in the triangle.
Until it looked like this!
Once she had finished with the bead stair, I brought out our bead bar cards 0-9 and placed them on the work rug. I named each number and counted the beads pictured on each card as I set them out one at a time. When all the cards were out, I returned to the first card. I said, “Zero.” I pointed to the empty space on the left side of the card, “Zero means nothing.” I moved on to the next card. “One. One red bead.” I found the one bead bar on our bead stair hanger and put it on the card.
We continued in this way through all the numbers 0 to 9. While l had presented it by putting the bead bar directly on top of the pictured bead bar on the card, L preferred to put them beside the picture instead of over top.
When we were finished, it looked like this!
Have you printed your copy of the Montessori Math Bead Bar Printable Bundle Pack yet? Even if you don’t own a bead stair or other physical Montessori math materials, you can use the cards in the same way — just count each of the beads pictured. The printable also comes in cursive if you prefer that, which would be great for older kids!
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