Math Whole Brain Teaching

I was pretty pumped about a whole brain teaching lesson I did the other day in Math class.
We are working on addition and subtraction to twelve, and of course all of the strategies involved in solving problems. The particular strategy we are working on is using doubles.
So the lesson went like this:
Mirrors on- "A doubles fact... means you take one number... and ADD the same number."
We repeated this a few times. I asked a few children if they knew what a doubles fact was. Some little darlings are still confused. We repeat again. Then I say "Peanut butter and Jelly", and they link hands with a partner. I had the PB's "Teach OK" what a doubles fact is, then switch and the jelly teaches the PB what a double fact is. When I asked again, the children seemed to know what they were.
Just goes to show that when you teach someone else, you are more likely to retain information than just listening.
NOW for those who think, BAH this is rote learning and there is no higher level thinking, WAIT FOR IT, WAIT FOR IT
We went through and wrote out the doubles facts to twelve. Then I asked the children if they noticed anything about the numbers, any patterns etc. 
Then a bright little firstie pointed out, "Look! The answers skip over one each time, skip counting by twos all the way down."
10 finger WOOOOOO to you.
And there you have it folks, higher level thinking stemming from some rote memorization tasks.
LOVE IT.

Mrs. Dunn