Montessori Golden Beads

 

The Montessori golden beads continues the child down the path of learning place value and the decimal system. Montessori golden beads are golden beads, all the same size, that are used to help students understand unit quantities of tens, hundreds and thousands. A single bead comprises one unit, or a point. Ten beads strung on a wire indicates ten, or a line. One hundred is indicated by ten bars side by side, which makes a square, and one thousand is ten one hundreds stacked on top of each other, making a cube. The goal for the young child is to garner a sense of quantities represented in the decimal system, and to see the exchange of quantities as units become ten, tens become hundred, and so on.