Mathematical Charts and Tables - Charts and Tables for Instruction
Charts and Tables for Instruction
Ancient Babylonian scribes learned to record numerical tables on clay tablets. If a schoolroom or library burned, the tablets baked hard, and might survive for millennia. Several such tablets are preserved in libraries today, and the replica of one of these at the Smithsonian reminds us of the long history of these objects.
In the 19th century, new European ideas about teaching arithmetic to very young children reached the United States. In 1831, the Boston firm of Munroe & Francis published a series of some fifty “infant school cards,” designed to teach subjects ranging from arithmetic to reading to natural history. Teachers were to use the arithmetic cards in conjunction with another piece of apparatus newly introduced in Western Europe and then in the United States, the teaching abacus or numeral frame.
Charts also were used to teach about weights and measures. In the wake of the French Revolution of 1789, the French developed an entirely new system of measuring distance, area, volume, temperature, and even time. By the 1860s, several European countries had adopted a revised version of this metric system, and metric weights and measures were legalized in the United States. An organization known as the American Metric Bureau began to distribute metric demonstration apparatus for the classroom. In the 1890s, the American Metric Bureau began to sell a metric chart for educational use.
Within the decade, the metric system was but one of several topics illustrated in a set of charts copyrighted by R. O. Evans of Chicago. Evans’ set of twenty charts illustrated such wide ranging topics as counting and writing numbers, arithmetic operations, fractions, the area of surfaces and the volumes of solid, business methods, and surveying.
In the first half of the 20th century, machines that could do ordinary arithmetic became common in the store and the office, and inexpensive adders were available for consumers. In the years following World War II, educators placed new emphasis on understanding the principles underlying arithmetic. Charts such as number lines sold for classroom use.
"Mathematical Charts and Tables - Charts and Tables for Instruction" showing 2 items.
Arithmetic Card for Use with a Numeral Frame
- Description
- In the 19th century, Americans began to teach young groups of children in classrooms. Some were designed especially for these children, and were called infant schools. To create a vivid impression on young minds, teachers used a numeral frame or abacus in combination with a chart like this one.
- The cardboard chart was part of a larger series. It has printing on both sides. One side is entitled: ARITHMETIC CARD III. It shows groups of like objects on the left, with one slightly different object on the right. Subtracting one fallen tree from two trees leaves one tree standing, Having one of three mounted trumpeters fall off his horse leaves two trumpeters riding. Further illustrations show the loss of one from larger groups. The reverse of this chart is entitled: ARITHMETIC CARD VII. It has groups of vertical lines on the left and three vertical lines on the right, and is designed to teach adding by three.
- A mark on the chart reads: INFANT SCHOOL CARDS, PUBLISHED BY MUNROE & FRANCIS, BOSTON.
- For another chart in the series, see CL*389116.28.
- Infant schools were popular in Boston around 1830, and the abacus was introduced into the Boston schools at about that time. Munroe & Francis was in business from the last decades of the 1700s until 1860 or so. In October 1831, The New England Magazine announced that the firm had just published “Complete Sets of Lessons on Cards for Infant Schools, consisting of 100 Lessons of every variety, on 50 Boards.” It seems likely that these cards were part of that set.
- Reference:
- “Works Published,” The New England Magazine, 1 (1831), p. 368.
- date made
- ca 1831
- maker
- Munroe & Francis
- ID Number
- CL*389116.04
- accession number
- 182022
- catalog number
- 389116.04
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Arithmetic Card for Use with a Numeral Frame
- Description
- In the 19th century, Americans began to teach young groups of children in classrooms. Some were designed especially for these children, and were called infant schools. To create a vivid impression on young minds, teachers used a numeral frame or abacus in combination with a chart like this one.
- This cardboard chart was part of a larger series. It has printing on both sides. It is labeled on one side: ARITHMETIC CARD II. This side shows a group of common objects on the left, and one of these objects on the right. It was designed to teach adding 1 to 6, 7, 8, and 9. Teachers were told to perform the same operation using balls on an abacus. The other side of this chart is entitled: ARITHMETIC CARD VI. It has groups of vertical lines on the left and two slanting lines on the right, and was meant to teach subtraction of 2. It also was to be used with an abacus.
- A mark on the chart reads: INFANT SCHOOL CARDS, PUBLISHED BY MUNROE & FRANCIS, BOSTON. For another chart in the series, see CL*389116.04.
- Infant schools were popular in Boston around 1830, and the abacus was introduced into the Boston schools at about that time. Munroe & Francis was in business from the last decades of the 1700s until 1860 or so. In October 1831, The New England Magazine announced that Munroe and Francis had just published “Complete Sets of Lessons on Cards for Infant Schools, consisting of 100 Lessons of every variety, on 50 Boards.” It seems likely that these cards were part of that set.
- Reference:
- “Works Published,” The New England Magazine, 1 (1831), p. 368.
- date made
- ca 1831
- maker
- Munroe & Francis
- ID Number
- CL*389116.28
- accession number
- 182022
- catalog number
- 389116.28
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center