Number Rods

Number Rods give every quantity from one to ten a body of its own, divided into red and blue sections so the child can count a rod without losing sight of it as one whole. The child carries the rods to the mat one at a time, builds them into a stair from longest to shortest and touches each section while saying its number. Laid out as a stair, the rods make it obvious that ten is longer than nine by exactly one unit, and they carry the first work on number names and their order. Setting the shortest rod against the end of another shows without a word whether the counting was right, because the two either reach the next rod exactly or they do not. They open the mathematics area from age three and lead on to the sandpaper numerals.