Big numbers in first grade? Of course! Especially since gifted students LOVE THEM!
So, after we gained a solid understanding of place value, we took the opportunity to make very big numbers.
Each student started with the digits 0-9
and attempted to make the greatest number.
We found a partner and put our numbers together.
1 - 2 - 3 comma, 1 - 2 - 3 comma...
This pair turned their 6's upside down
to make an even greater number.
Clever!
Someone exclaimed, "Let's put all our digits together!"
We ran out of teacher generated digits and made our own!
We added lots of "Zero the Heroes!"
Some used big sheets of paper.
One student started to make more commas and announced,
"Commas for sale! Commas for sale!"
The number twisted and twirled all around our classroom
and so did the Navigators!
You would have thought that we had just won
a championship game and everyone had gone out on the field
and was jumping up and down in celebration.
It was a magical moment!
And here is our number (approximately)
39,999,999,998,888,777,755,544,433,332,211,100,052,943,
108,432,985,710,674,322,100,310,528,431,975,866,547,998,
958,129,740,901,299,596,849,068,948,887,727,753,565,355,999,997,971,998,352,101,622,483,099,599,134,214,091,030,713,131,411,995,142,214,849,110,314,113,213,313,991,199,
999,119,893,086,917,633,711,999,299,399,999,994,381,999,
999,999 (not including all the extra 0's)
We then entered the digits, three at a time, into a website called Mathcat and discovered that our number was:
thirty-nine quattuoroctogintillion,
nine hundred ninety-nine treoctogintillion,
nine hundred ninety-nine duooctogintillion,
nine hundred ninety-eight unoctogintillion,
eight hundred eighty-eight octogintillion,
seven hundred seventy-seven novemseptuagintillion,
seven hundred fifty-five octoseptuagintillion,
five hundred forty-four septseptuagintillion,
four hundred thirty-three sexseptuagintillion,
three hundred thirty-two quinseptuagintillion......
and so on and so on for pages and pages!
(BTW, the first grade common core standard is place value up to 120.)
"Each digit has a place and that place has a value. That's why we call it...everyone? PLACE VALUE!"
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