them, became a community of learners who worked out mistakes together and
revised their work when an answer didn’t make sense.
The following is an example of how I structured experiences for my math club
students to prepare them for the work we would be doing in class. In class, we
were preparing to be able to read and locate numbers on a large class 10,000 chart
that we made together (Russell et al. 2008h). I knew the students in the math
club would need practice with adding and subtracting multiples of 10 and 100
before they could understand the place value of numbers on the 10,000 chart.
First, I gave them extra practice with their 1,000 books, which they had created
themselves, earlier in the unit. The 1,000 books consisted of 10 partially filled 100
charts. The students fill in enough landmark numbers on each chart so that they
can locate any other given number (see Figure 19–4).
Next, we used the 1,000 books to play a game called Changing Places (Russell
et al. 2008h). In this game, students start at any given number and move to a new
position in the book by adding and subtracting multiples of 10 and 100. For
example, they might start at 275 and then move 20, –30, 300 to land on 565.
They then fill in this new number in their 1,000 book. After we reviewed the
directions for the Changing Places game, the students played for five minutes. We
then discussed what was happening to the starting numbers as they added or sub-
tracted multiples of 10 and 100. Students noted, for example, that if they added
a 20, the 10s place changed and sometimes the 100s place changed, but the digit
in the 1s place did not. After a few more examples and sharing of thoughts, I
asked the question, “What would be different or the same about finding numbers
Getting “Un-Stuck”201 210
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270290280300Figure 19–4.