Nesta is a young girl determined to have a really BIG number to take to school. She visits her grumpy neighbour, Mr. Abacus, the mathematician, in the hopes he will lend her one of his many numbers. Nesta finally convinces him to lend one of his huge numbers, only to have it meet with disaster. During her apology, Mr. Abacus shares the secret of infinity, and Nesta discovers the biggest number in the universe.

1.

Prior to reading the story, ask students

• What is the biggest number you know?

and assess the understanding students have of place value and number place names, as well as the concept of infinity.

• Can you think of a number bigger than that?

2.

Share the story with students, and during reading, engage them with the mathematic vocabulary within the story.

• Why is Mr Abacus a good name for a mathematician?
• What other names would be good for characters who are mathematicians?
• Why is a “pie” a good gift for a mathematician?
• What does Nesta mean when she says she already has five?
• Why would the “2” be misbehaving?
• What does Mr Abacus mean by ”the biggest number is one”?

3.

Following the reading, revisit p. 16–17 and investigate the containers for the numbers in Mr Abacus’s kitchen. Also investigate the end papers (inside the front and back covers).

• What sorts of containers are used for different kinds of numbers?
  (for example, Very Old Numbers in Grecian urns, Hong Kong 7s in a trophy cup, 100 in a spider web, extra large figures in an IRD jar)

4.

Ask students to brainstorm different kinds of containers for other groups of numbers.

• What sort of container could we use to keep: squares, evens, odds, cubes, primes, lucky numbers, multiples of ten, remainders, fractions, and formulas?

5.

Provide students with materials to create number containers and display these on a set of “shelves” on a bulletin board. Leave spaces to create new containers as different groups or types of numbers are investigated over the year (like an “octo-pot” for the 8x table or a broken jar for fractions).

6.

As a follow-up, students can go “hunting” for numbers around the school environment and take digital photos as records of where numbers can be found and what kinds of numbers are found in certain places.