Addition's "Buddy" Carl Guass

Gauss at 51.

Not that long ago, in a town called Braunschweig there lived a young boy who would grow up to be known as the prince of Mathematicians!

His name was Carl Freidich Gauss and was born on April 30, 1777.

Carl was a child prodigy. At the age of seven, little Gauss started elementary school, and his potential was noticed almost immediately. His teacher, Büttner, and his assistant, Martin Bartels, were amazed when Gauss summed the integers from 1 to 100 instantly by spotting that the sum was 50 pairs of numbers each pair summing to 101.  -- Ref. Mac Tutor History of Mathematics archive.

ColorMyMath's "Buddies" addition goal is a simpler example that the prodigy Gauss employed as a boy. Gauss spotted pairs that summed to 101, we spot the pairs that sum to 10.  

ColorMyMath names the pairs that sum to 10  "Buddies".  For example, nine and one are buddies:  9 + 1.  8 + 2,   7 + 3,  6 + 4,   5 + 5 are all buddy pairs. 

Beginning understandings of the buddy pairs is a matter of asking the child "why" they are buddies. The answer is of course, "They add to ten". The buddies is the third of four goals in achieving mastery of  Everyday Mathematics easy addition facts. 

In addition to teaching the easy facts ColorMyMath introduces two other simpler patterns . Teaching the Buddies to elementary students is one reason why ColorMyMath builds better foundations for the future. 

Visually, the Easy Facts and its four goals look great in a triangle.

 

The first addition goal from the well known Everyday Mathematics curriculum is sums that add to 10 or less. These 25 "Easy Facts" are lumped together as one big goal. What makes ColorMyMath different and better than Everyday Mathematics  is that we organize these  "Easy" facts into 4 smaller parts. Additionally, the child is shown 2 other patterns in  goals 1 and 2.