The Lab Gear Is Back

The Lab Gear is a comprehensive manipulative environment I designed for the teaching and learning of algebra. I was in part inspired by previous visual models of polynomial arithmetic, the ones conceived by Zoltan Dienes, Mary Laycock, and Peter Rasmussen. I took these ideas further, and created curriculum materials spanning pre-algebra to Algebra 2, paying special attention to the transition from blocks to symbols, making connections with graphing, mapping out a remarkably accessible approach to completing the square and the quadratic formula, and pioneering "3D" blocks.

 

Unfortunately, the Lab Gear's original publisher has long ago been gobbled up by ever-bigger corporations, and the product ended up in the clutches of a publisher I will call MH. They had little interest in manipulatives, and stopped publicizing the Lab Gear, gradually letting different parts of it become unavailable, starting in 2002. Around the same time, their responses to my e-mails became fewer and farther between. Over the next 11 years, as things disappeared from their catalogs and Web site, I was never offered what my contract supposedly guaranteed: advanced warning, and a chance to buy the remaining stock at an author discount. I usually heard from strangers who e-mailed me that (for example) the 3D blocks were no longer available, or the Middle School binder was out of print. Each time, I asked MH for the rights to revert to me. Sometimes they responded, sometimes I was ignored.

Eventually, in 2013, an MH employee decided I had suffered enough, and started working on a full reversal of the rights to me, as guaranteed by my contract. This guy was a hero, and powered through the bureaucracy until in early 2014, I had all the documents I needed to approach another publisher. Whew! That was the end of an unpleasant 12-year saga.

I approached Didax, who had already published my book of pentomino lessons (Working with Pentominoes), and they agreed to take this on. They are having the blocks manufactured in the configuration I suggested, which will include the 3D blocks, and will have a better balance of types of blocks, based on which get the most use in the classroom. The two-student package will also include two corner pieces, something I had been unable to get from the previous publisher. They also sell a full class set, and I'm hoping they will make more Lab Gear materials available over time. However the most important thing has already happened: the Lab Gear is once again available.

I will start work on an updated version of the books in September. Until that is available, e-mail me if you are buying the blocks and want to work with the old version while waiting.

--Henri