Ruler-free Measuring and Monsters

We know how many inches are in a foot, and and how many feet are in a mile, but what about using other objects measure things?   We know the numbers 1-10, but what about seeing how many these really are?  We combined these two questions, using Unifix cubes to measure objects in our classroom.   Each child found an object that measured one cube high, then two cubes high, all the way to ten.  How creative Gan kids are (!)  finding everything from the sponges we use for painting (one cube high) to the easel leg (ten cubes high).

We've been looking at where numbers fall in a number line using Monsters!  Two monsters, one on the right and one on the left, straddle numbers (1-20, for example).  At this point, I think of a number. One monster "eats" its way to cover an incorrect an incorrect number guess, from the left if too small, from the right if too large.  I consistently amazed how few guesses we need to find that number.  Ask your child about the Monster Squeeze game!