The kindergarten volume has a special format to help teachers engage the interests and meet the developmental needs of this age group. Each set of lessons includes the use of chants, rhymes, role-playing activities, or picture books; students have many opportunities to listen to and help each other, share the work, and make decisions. These experiences support children’s vocabulary development, oral expression, and listening comprehension.

• In Set 1, children investigate number meaning and relationships as they count objects and data.
  
• Set 2 gives children opportunities to explore the underlying concepts of addition and subtraction and to use manipulatives to explore counting on and counting backward.
  
• Set 3 further builds on children’s knowledge of whole numbers as they compose and decompose numbers, solve problems, and count objects by twos and by fives.

Throughout the units, children are encouraged to recognize how their behavior affects others, to think about the underlying values that guide behavior, and to develop appropriate cooperative skills.