tlh teacher’s little helper
Approach · kinesthetic

Hands-on bundling & trading

For learners who benefit from movement and physical materials, run the place-value lesson as a hands-on "bundling" activity rather than board work.

Set up

Provide real countable objects (gumnuts, pop-sticks, counters, or bundling straws) and elastic bands. Mark five hoops or trays on the floor labelled ones, tens, hundreds, thousands, ten-thousands.

Do

This makes the place-holder zero concrete: an empty tray must still be counted when reading the number left to right.