[TeacherCarrie]

You could also go about having them use a number line. But make it physical. Write numbers on index cards and have one card with zero on it. Call students up to hold the cards and stand on the correct side of the number line at the front of the classroom. Then, have another student come up and represent what you are adding or taking away. Something along those lines, so the students can see where the positive and negative integers lie on the numberline and what the number becomes when it is used in an algorithm.