Introductory set of golden bead material

The material "Introduction To The Decimal System" introduces the decimal system to the child. The child can feel quantites through their senses and learns the basic names used in work with Golden Bead Material.

The direct goals:

Experiencing und understanding of decimal units through senses (touch, sight, proprioception)

The indirect goals:

Connecting counting to geometry the child experiences the geometric parameters with representations of quantity as well as practicing fine motoric skills and concentration.

The child learns the following vocabulary while working with the material:

• unit – indicates one individual bead, we say: 1 unit, 2 units…..
• ten – indicates one bar with 10 beads, we say 1 ten, 2 tens….
• hundred – indicates one square with 100 beads, we say 1 hundred, 2 hundreds ….
• thousand – indicates one cube with 1 000 beads, we say 1 thousand, 2 thousands ….

Age recommendation:

From 4 years

Material / size:

• 1 wooden tray with separators
• 1 Thousand cube
• 1 Hundred square
• 1 Ten rod
• 1 individual Bead

Beads are made of plastic; Boxes are made of wood. Please note that any colour variations on the pictures are only due to items having been taken in different lighting conditions at different times and that all the beads of a set are identically golden coloured.

Presentation of Introduction to bead material:

Show your child where she can find the material and let her carry her to the table.

Show your child the one bead unit and say, "This is one unit." Let your child hold and feel the bead.

Next, introduce her the ten golden bead rod, and say, "This is one ten." Again, the child can hold the ten golden bead rod and count the beads.

Show the 100 square and tell your child, "This is one hundred." Let her count the 10 gold bead rods in the square to find out that it is made of 10 golden bead rods.

Lastly, show your child the thousand cube, and say it is called one thousand. Count with your child to show her that ten hundreds are one thousand.

Let your child hold and compare the bead systems.

Ask your child if she can show you, 1, 10, 100, 1000. Mix up the quantities several times and ask in random order the quantities, such as 10, 1, 1000, and 100.

Ask the name of the quantities, 1,10,100, and 1000.

Let the child to put the material back to its place to finish the work. 

Typically used in schools this material is not usually bought by Homeschoolers as it is only used once per child and can be created with other materials.

We recommend instead the following Golden Beads sets which contain more items and can be used for calculations.

Golden Beads Set (1 cube (thousands), 10 squares (hundreds), 45 rods (tens), 100 beads (units) + boxes/trays)

Complete Golden Beads set (9 cube (thousands), 45 squares (hundreds), 45 rods (tens), 100 beads (units) + boxes/trays)