Children Together Presents: Order! Compare! Estimate!

Register today!  Early Registration Discount & Group Discounts available!   Registration:  3:30 - 4:00pm Conference:  4:00 - 7:00pm Children Together is proud to present: Order! Compare! Estimate!   Building Knowledge and Excitement about Foundational Math Concepts for Preschoolers  Presented by: Alissa Lange, Ph.D What do we do before we eat snack?  Which tower has more blocks?  Will all of these toy cars fit in my bucket? Children ask questions like this all day long, and they have incredible capacity to answer them when equipped with the right tools. We will discuss how to support all children - including children with special needs - to mathematize their worlds. We will focus on three math topics that are less commonly found in preschool: ordering, comparing, and estimating. Through group discussions, video analysis, and hands-on activities, we will explore: 1)  how these skills connect to other domains (e.g., retelling storybook events in order) 2)  how they develop in children (e.g., what do children need to know to compare numerals?) 3)  effective strategies to bring them to life (e.g., including a referent jar when estimating) Participants will leave with example activities to try in the classroom and inspiration to support children as they talk about, play with, and get excited to use math to understand the world around them. About the presenter: Alissa A. Lange, Ph.D, is an Associate Professor of Early Childhood Education at East Tennessee State University. Prior to joining ETSU, Dr. Lange was an Assistant Research Professor at the National Institute for Early Education Research at Rutgers University, a U.S. Fulbright Scholar in Bogotá, Colombia, and a U.S. Department of Education, Institute of Educational Sciences (IES) Postdoctoral Fellow with Doug Clements and Julie Sarama. Dr. Lange has over 10 years of experience leading or co-leading early STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) teaching and learning initiatives, including the National Science Foundation-funded preschool STEM professional development project, SciMath-DLL. She has presented the results of her work at many national conferences and to members of Congress in 2015. Her work is published in outlets such as Early Childhood Research Quarterly and Teaching Young Children, and her book on preschool STEM education will be published in 2019 with Teachers College Press. She is a co-facilitator of the new NAEYC Early Math Interest Forum and she has taught both children and adults.