Anno’s Counting Book

One of my favorite changes recently in math adoption programs is the addition of quality literacy materials. In my district’s current math adoption, each teacher received a series of math texts to be used as read alouds and a big book. I love that publishers are starting to understand content area integration and providing support and materials to facilitate that process. 

Starting in the early 2000’s, when I first starting using the math adoption Investigations, I will admit it took me a while to really understand how to implement it in the classroom. I was used to very traditional math programs and Investigations definitely is not traditional. One of my favorite parts of the series were the trade books and the activities that aligned with them. Classic texts like Mouse Count added a fun twist on traditional math instruction. In Kindergarten, one of the most fundamental pieces of the curriculum is numeracy and helping children develop a deep understanding of numbers and number concept that will help them as they move onto more complicated topics in the future.

In Anno’s Counting Book, the story develops as through each page more images are added, but always in sets equal to the number for the page. For example “Page 0” is completely blank. Then, on “Page 1” there is one house, one sun, one tree, etc. I used this book a ton throughout the year and finally went on Amazon and bought the big book. Last time I check it was around $16.00, which, as big books go, is pretty decent.

In the Investigations series, after reading Anno’s Counting Book, the students make their own counting book named after themselves. They have pages similar to Anno’s, and as they move through the book they complete it in the same way. So for example, on “Page 2” the student mike draw two chairs, two pencils, two students, two dogs, etc. The point is that they are not just making on representation of the number, but really understanding the number as a set.

As an adult, I think back on my own math instruction as a child and remember how I easily picked up addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, but I really was just memorizing facts. One of the best gifts we can give kids early is a deep understanding of numbers and I love finding books that can help me do that.