Henri Picciotto's

Lab Gear

The Lab Gear is a comprehensive manipulative environment I designed for the teaching and learning of algebra. It is sold by Creative Publications, along with two binders: Algebra Lab (Middle School), and Lab Gear Activities for Algebra 1.

For a full training on the Lab Gear, the algebra manipulative I designed, see the video course I helped write for Dr. Ed Dickey of the University of South Carolina. (Where to get it.) Or hire me to run an in-service or pre-service workshop. I can introduce the Lab Gear in one or two days, or incorporate that into a more general course on teaching algebra, which can run from two to ten days.

• Links
• What to Buy
• A whole book in PDFs Algebra Lab: High School
  (followed by a brief comparison of the three available books)

On this site

An introduction to Base 10 blocks and the Lab Gear, followed by a general discussion of the uses and limitations of manipulatives. (Part of a longer article on "Early Mathematics".)

A visual demo of Lab Gear basics, by George Collison.

An applet to explore and discuss the factoring of a trinomial, using the Lab Gear model.

A gallery of three items for the SmartBoard and its Notebook software. Each will give you an unlimited supply of Lab Gear blocks to manipulate on the board.

A Lab Gear / graphing connection (PDF).

A rather technical comparison of the Lab Gear with other models of polynomials, including a history of algebra manipulatives.

Related links

See: Algebra and Manipulatives.

What to Buy

Frequently Asked Question
I get much e-mail asking: "I would like to use the Lab Gear. What should I buy?" I suggest a two-year plan, in order to spread out the expense:

Year 1

• Enough "student pair" Lab Gear bags for your classes. (Each bag contains 30 ones, 10 fives, 4 twenty-fives, 18 x, four 5x, 10 x^2, 7 xy, 13 y, two 5y, four y^2, and only one corner piece.)
• Additional corner pieces so you have enough for every student to have one.
• Lab Gear for the overhead.
• The binder most appropriate to your grade level: Algebra Lab (Middle School), or Lab Gear Activities for Algebra 1. All you need is one copy per teacher, as you have permission to duplicate work sheets for your own classes.)

Year 2

• As many 3D Lab Gear bags as you have student pair bags.
• The other binder.

If you can afford to buy it all at once, go for it.

Note: I am paid no royalties on the plastic, but I do get about three dollars per binder.

Where to order all this.

A whole book in PDFs

Download any or all of it for your non-commercial use.

The Algebra Lab: High School
A comprehensive manipulative
program for Algebra 1
by Henri Picciotto

• Front Matter

1. Meeting the Algebra Lab Gear
2. Computing with Signed Numbers
3. Getting to Know the Lab Gear
4. Simplifying Algebraic Expressions
5. Multiplying and Dividing
6. Combining Operations
7. Solving Equations
8. Factoring
9. More Equation Solving

• Back Matter

-- The whole book (6.5 MB)

This book (ALHS, written in 1990) has many great lessons, some of them available nowhere else, and offers a good introduction to the Lab Gear for teachers. Much of it is merged into the textbook Algebra: Themes, Tools, Concepts. However, ALHS is not as easy to use with students as the two binders that are still in print with Creative Publications: The Algebra Lab: Middle School (ALMS), and Lab Gear Activities for Algebra 1 (LGA).

ALMS is a subset of ALHS, but better presented and easier to use. LGA was written five years later. It is better sequenced, and includes some new material, including connections with graphing. Both are suitable for grades 7-9, and LGA has some lessons that work well in Algebra 2.

Still, there are many activities in I recommend for classroom use in The Algebra Lab: High School. In particular, check out the Explorations. (See pp. ix-x in the front matter for an overview and index of those.) Plus it has the advantage of being free!