Focus on the Child videos are taken from one-on-one interviews with individual children. The interviews are designed to elicit evidence of children’s mathematical thinking. They are not teaching episodes or formal assessments.
July 19, 2022
“More” is often one of children’s first words. Infants attend to differences, though they don’t yet discriminate between "more" as quantity or magnitude/size or intensity of sensation. Toddlers are beginning to differentiate between attributes and…
This child uses the visual arrangement of a ten frame to conceptually subitize quantities into the teen numbers. He recognizes a full row as a unit of 5 and uses that to derive larger numbers…
This child encounters a new type of problem situation: a part-part-whole story where both parts are unknown. He is uncertain how to model the problem at first but has some success with adult support. Focus…
This child uses cubes to model a part-part-whole problem where the whole is unknown. He uses a counting all strategy. He counts out each part and then counts them altogether, starting from one. Focus on…
We all know that babies aren’t born walking, talking, following directions, counting, or measuring size. But they do enter the world hard-wired with instincts that will mature and develop into those skills in the preschool…
Long before they can talk or explain, babies are thinking logically and exploring ordinary everyday objects, sensations, and experiences that are new to them. Encouraging and celebrating their explorations and discoveries is a highly effective…
What is cardinality? And how is it related to counting? The common definition of cardinality states that it’s the understanding that the last number word said when counting tells how many in all.
The math story this second grader solves is a change unknown story. There was a full carton of a dozen eggs but some were eaten, leaving only 3 eggs. After making sense of the problem,…
A second-grade student solves a variety of addition and subtraction math stories. Using his fingers as math tools, he is able to solve the stories, even as what is known or unknown shifts.
A second-grader works on basic number combinations as we see him playing a comparison card game, Capture It. He is accurate when comparing sums but is still developing his efficiency and flexibility, key indications of…