The Clothespin Pinterest fail- and win!

So I did this long ago, and was going to blog about it but just never got around to it! So finally it is summer and I have time to catch up. I tried this idea from Pinterest and for me, it was a FAIL. (from Middle School For Life). The clothespins broke, the pins fell off and it was a hot mess for me in my room.

So instead I tried this with much better results. I bought plastic clothespins from Walmart that look something like this. They have to be flat at the top. I then pushed the pin THROUGH the plastic and pushed it into the wall. Well, it lasted the rest of the year and is still going strong.

Here is what it looked like, I use this board to put up my students math work activities and it works GREAT!

Math Centres... Numbers 1-100 and Skip Counting

This year I have been trying a WHOLE new approach to math because in the past...well...let's just say that math wasn't my most favourite thing to teach ;)
And let me tell you, what a difference, my kids love it and I look forward to teaching it, nothing better than that.
So basically it revolves around a weekly system of teaching and centre based practice of outcomes.

A LOOK AT MY WEEK
Monday- I complete a full lesson on the outcomes, we practice as a class and then the students practice in groups, partners or on their own.
Tuesday- I complete a mini lesson on the outcome and then go through the centre activities. Students complete one centre.
Wednesday- I complete a mini lesson on the outcome and then students complete two centres.
Thursday- I complete a mini lesson on the outcome and then students complete two centres.
Friday- We review what we have learned over the week and complete any unfinished centres.

How I set up rotations:
I have a bulletin board with each of the centres
CAMPP
Computers, Alone, Manipulatives, Problem Solve, and Partner
Each group is listed underneath of the title card, and when they complete a centre then I just move the groups to the next space. I have three bins with binders to contain paperwork. The students complete all activities in their math interactive notebook.

Here are some sample centre activities from this unit. They especially love the partner games and playing on the computer. At the alone centre I get a chance to work with small groups on areas that they need improvement. The centres really allow for differentiation as I can put different manipulatives and activities into the bins as the groups work through them.

You can find my entire unit HERE.

Mrs. Dunn

Another video! Skip counting

Every morning in math since about November I have played a flash it game with my students to develop subitizing skills and number sense. I put groups of objects, starting small in different arrangements and groups on the smart board, and flash three times. This way the children don't have time to count and must recognize arrangements quickly. After we practiced this lots, we have now started working on using flash it to skip count. Again, it forces the students to group and count because there is not enough time to count each individual object.
After we count the objects, student make groups of two students (peanut butter and jelly) and then tell each other how many they saw and verbalize how they know the number based on groupings and how they counted. 
I think this all sounds a bit confusing, watch the video below to see how it's done!!

Mrs. Dunn

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

Documenting Learning in Math

Today we were talking about how a number stays the same no matter what the arrangement of objects looked like. I used whole brain teaching to start, MIRROR, showed them how to arrange, then, TEACH OK, students showed each other how the number stays the same, then back to our desk to work with a partner.

SOOO I had this idea that I would film them as they were working with a partner. I normally just walk around and shout things like, DON'T put that counter up your nose or can you PLEASE not make alien pictures and do your job. Today students were actually pretty well on task, so I grabbed my camera and started filming.

The results were very interesting. I noted that many students were still counting to determine how many, even though their partner had just rearranged the counters. 

My thought is that tomorrow's math lesson, I will show them a video example of students  working with a partner and NOT having to count to know how many. Then we will discuss what we see and try again. 

Thoughts? How do you document student understanding in math?

Mrs. Dunn

Using Literature to teach Patterns in Math

Have you ever notice that there are patterns EVERYWHERE? If you haven't, a first grader can tell you all about it! Once we begin this unit (it is the first one in math for us) they are like pattern detectives, they can find them anywhere. One of our favourite places to look is, of course, in a book!

One of my absolute, all time favourite books to read is Pattern Fish, and Pattern Bugs, by Trudy Harris, shows many different kinds of patterns, and the translation lessons that you can do with this book, well let me tell you, it is so much fun! The kids love to make their own pattern fish and pattern bugs after we are finished reading these stories.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear is a classic story that I love to use for my patterning unit. Students enjoy reading this book because of the easy to remember word pattern. It is a valuable tool to teach that not just shapes, numbers, and colours can be patterns. We can also find words and sentence patterns in stories.

After we read Brown Bear we create our own story about shapes that follows the same word pattern format. I show the students the ABC pattern with pictures first, then we put the sentence strips in order on a pocket chart. We read this new pattern story as a class, and then I tell the students that they will now be the Author and make a story as a class all about patterns! 

They love creating class books and reading them over, and OVER again from the class library. Once each student completes a page, we put it together and read it. The kids feel so much ownership and pride when they hear their page being read in front of the class. Do you want to do this activity with your class? Click on the picture to find the activity.

Do you have any other favourite pattern stories that you love to read to your class?