Coin Counting Fluency

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Counting coins has always been a difficult skill for my little ones. According to the Common Core, we don't have to teach money in first grade. But then my second graders are supposed to be solving word problems about coins. That's a pretty big leap from point A to point B in my book. So this time of year, we all do a little coin counting each day.The first half of the year we spend most of our time highlighting odd and even numbers on the 100 Chart and learning different number patterns. The second half of the year, I can use that prior knowledge to their advantage when introducing coin values and learning to count by those values.

 Here, we started with counting pennies and dimes. These are the number patterns (counting by ones and tens) that my class was most familiar with, so it's an easy place to start. Even though we weren't counting quarters yet, I introduced it's value by placing a quarter in front of the 25.

 

When we were ready to start counting quarters, I placed one in front of the 25, 50, 75, and 100. I also highlighted those numbers using the blue and green cards. We quickly practiced counting quarters during calendar time, starting at 25 and working our way to 100. It's an oral and visual experience that only takes a few seconds. We will do this everyday for a week or two before moving onto nickles. At that time I will remove all the other coins out and start filling up the chart with nickles.

 

Once they have a firm grasp on individual coin values,  you can start displaying coin combinations. Here we can see that one dime alone equal ten cents, but the two nickles underneath will also equal ten cents. I find that as long as the chart is on display, it is not uncommon for students to walk over to the chart throughout the day and practice counting these patterns on their own. It's on the list of things they're allowed to do if they finish up their work early.

Hoping this post gave you some ideas to increase coin counting fluency in your class!

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You can visit next blog on this hop, Mrs. Shipley's Classroom, to read about Whole Brain Teaching strategies. Alternatively, you may browse through all the other fantastic bloggers who have linked up below! Read through the topics to see what's going on at each stop!!