Story: In this vitamin, students work to measure the length of a much-needed micro blaster for one of their literature characters. You see he has been shrunk to a fraction of his original size and needs to climb a distance equal to each child’s length of string to get back to the micro blaster up on the table. Students are estimating the string lengths and using Cuisenaire rods to measure their string segments, count the blocks and figure out the total length in centimeters. In the video, you see one student exploring how to measure a curved string, another learning to compare centimeter cubes to equal length rods and another student count and count on from 50 units in sets of ten and then transition to ones.

Suggested manipulatives: Measurement is so fun to explore, as you can have students measure almost anything in your classroom environment and you can use both standard and non-standard units of measure. In this case, students were using centimeters (something standard) as their base unit and exploring that relationship to cuisenaire rods. You could also measure using non-standard tools like hands or shoes, books, pens etc.

Prep time: Adapting the vitamin wording to fit your specific story, putting manipulatives out in the room, creating the various string lengths and copying the vitamin documentation forms will take about 15-20 minutes. Set up is always more fun and shorter on time if you do this activity with a colleague.

Classroom time: Asking children to “do their best work” for each Math Vitamin assumes that some children will need a longer time than others. Ideally you want to offer a block of time for Math Vitamin projects and have another task available (writing, free exploration etc.) for those students who finish work prior to their peers. For this project allow 20-45 minutes for students to work through all the steps.

How to individualize/stretch: Start with measuring small lengths and build counting skills. As learning progresses, increase the length to be measured as well as the complexity of the manipulative (higher levels of abstraction) like base ten blocks or Cuisenaire rods.