IKEA Abacus no long available? Another one with similar price?

[kayte]

I had an Abacus from IKEA on DD's holiday/birthday list but it seems they recently discontinued it.

Anyone else make one that is wood and not outrageously priced?

[vludmilla]

Melissa and Doug sells one for about the same price, maybe $10. I've seen it at Borders where you can use a 20% off coupon.

[kayte]

Great --thanks! I would have never thought to get it at Borders!

[MamaKath]

http://www.melissaanddoug.com/dyn_search.php?q=abacus&button.x=0&button.y=0&button=Go

http://www.brainbuildingtoys.com/abacus/?cPath=

http://www.toysrus.com/search/index.jsp?kwCatId=&kw=abacus&origkw=abacus&f=Taxonomy/TRUS/2254197&sr=1

I know a few years ago I found one at TRU really cheap after Christmas. You can also search online to find methods to teach kids to actually use them beyond simple playing with the beads. I was just searching but was getting a lot of using a Chinese abacus vs. a school abacus. If I find one, I'll post it. :-)

[MamaKath]

I no you didn't ask for this, but I thought it might be helpful. This site explains how to use a child's abacus for calculating. I guess it is referred to as a "Simple Abacus" which is why I have had a hard time finding it. They have all kinds of info, you can even put a number in, it will show it on the abacus, then you can have it count on. Pretty cool! Now I want to go play with the abacus myself, lol.
http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/numbers/machine/abacus.htm

There are tons of sites available for using a Chinese abacus also, just go to Yahoo or Google.

[kayte]

I no you didn't ask for this, but I thought it might be helpful. This site explains how to use a child's abacus for calculating. I guess it is referred to as a "Simple Abacus" which is why I have had a hard time finding it. They have all kinds of info, you can even put a number in, it will show it on the abacus, then you can have it count on. Pretty cool! Now I want to go play with the abacus myself, lol.
http://gwydir.demon.co.uk/jo/numbers/machine/abacus.htm

There are tons of sites available for using a Chinese abacus also, just go to Yahoo or Google.

Very cool! Thanks!

[MamaKath]

Okay found a couple more links that would be helpful to use (and with all the math discussion in the lounge, well...) :-)

http://mumsgather.blogspot.com/2008/05/using-simple-100-bead-abacus-to-teach.html

http://www.alabacus.com/pageView.cfm?pageID=315 (alabacus is the one I couldn't remember off my old computer)

[kali]

I'm really curious--what's the difference between a school abacus and a Chinese abacus? I remember being taught how to use one in elementary school and the teacher said that it was a "Chinese calculator".

Also, thanks for the links. We have the Ikea one and DS is getting to the age where we could use it to teach math, but I can't remember how, lol!

[MamaKath]

I'm really curious--what's the difference between a school abacus and a Chinese abacus? I remember being taught how to use one in elementary school and the teacher said that it was a "Chinese calculator".

The frame and number of beads is different on a Chinese abacus.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abacus
This actually gives a bit of history and shows pics of many different counting frames.

HTH~ :)