MathWise Number Sense: Developing Power with Numbers

For a video description of the MathWise series of workbooks click on the "Follow the Author" - Peter L. Wise.

MathWise Number Sense teaches students the basics of manipulating numbers and understanding how numbers work. It provides students with basic and advanced skills dealing with all four operations. Tips and tricks are used to show students clever and creative ways to work with numbers.

The skills taught in this book reduce cognitive load by giving students facility with numbers and teaching them creative strategies to enable them to work at greater efficiency. By learning and practicing a variety of approaches to calculation, students are better equipped to build of web of understanding with numbers. Lastly, by developing number sense skill, students are better able to check their answers for reasonableness.

Topics include:

• Breaking apart numbers
• Making tens, adding tens
• Looking for 5s to make tens
• Doubling numbers and looking for a carry
• Adding and subtracting 9s as 1 less than 10
• Adding and subtracting 8s
• Adding by doubling the middle number
• Division problems involving zeros
• Expanded notation, using the “Triangle Trick”
• Rounding
• Mean, Median, Mode
• Shortcuts for multiplying 5s
• Finding new factor pairs
• Multiplying when adding
• Estimation
• The Distributive Property with multiplication
• Multiplying 4s, 6s, 8s, 12s as multi-step problems

Peter Wise, a veteran teacher of over 30 years, has developed innovative and strategic methods for teaching math and motivating students. He has coached math teams and taught hundreds of students in before- and after-school math clubs. His teaching techniques have been featured in newspaper reports and recognized on TV. He is a member of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, and was nominated for Teacher of the Year in California and Colorado.

His own two children (who helped him with the MathWise books) competed successfully in state and national math competitions.

A resident of Colorado, he also enjoys music, chess, and hiking.