Have you checked out Greg Tang's website?

You might know Greg Tang from his great math books like The Best of Times,  The Grapes of Math, or Math Potatoes.   Many of his books are included in our Math Reads sets that we received last year.  His books are great mentor texts for reading, writing, or math workshop!  He includes strategies to help the reader make sense of the numbers.

Whether you are familiar with his books or not, his website is a great resource for all grades!
On this site, he has activities that correlate with his books. (One of these could make a great minilesson.) He has a word problem generator which allows you to differentiate your problems depending on student needs.  In addition to those great features, the site also has some pretty awesome games.  These games are leveled and many can be used from K-5.  The games allow for practice on subitizing, coins, integers on a number line, and more.

I think this site deserves a look-see.  Let me know what you think!

Can you KenKen?

I recently found KenKen puzzles.  They have some similarities to Sudoku puzzles, but they include use of operations to complete the puzzle.  I think they would be a great problem-solving option during your math workshop.  It would be good practice for all kiddos, but it would really allow your kids who have their facts down to work on building that fluency that they need.

This site allows  you to customize your KenKen puzzles. (It also explains to you how they work.) You may have to do a few together as a class before you set the kids loose on them, but I think that students in Grades 1-5 could do these puzzles.  The site will allow you to differentiate the puzzles by operation and difficulty.

To try one online as a class, you can click here.  This one changes daily, and you will not be able to differentiate the problems here, so the day's puzzle might not work for students in Grades 1-2.

Problem-solving is such a key part to creating successful mathematicians, and I think KenKen puzzles provide an easy way for you to implement some good student involvement, math vocabulary, and problem solving!

Comment below if you have used these or if you know of another place to locate some KenKen puzzles.

Building Number Talk

Mr. Elementary Math has a lot of great ideas.  This is one that I thought I would share.  This document  he shared has two templates:  one geared for primary grades and one geared for intermediate grades.

He calls this activity The Amazing Race.  The premise is simple.  Pair students.  Choose a number for them to put in the "Number of the Day" box.  They then work with their partner to come up with as many ways to decompose that number as possible.  He recommends starting with decompositions to help build place value knowledge, but I think as your students' abilities progress, you could begin to ask for other ways.

Teachers can move from very easy numbers to decimals, fractions, or exponents depending on their students and needs.

There are many ways it could be used in a classroom:  in a math rotation, as an opening or closing activity, as a challenge activity, as an early-finisher activity...No matter when you use it, I recommend that you get students to collaborate and talk math. It is a great opportunity to use and build their math vocabulary.

Grades 1-5: Extension Options for Unit 3

Looking for some activities for your students  in Unit 3 of Everyday Math?  Here are some great activities which will allow them the opportunity to collaborate with classmates, explore strategies, and build math talk.

1st GRADE:

Strike it Out--Game that mixes addition and subtraction with strategy.
Moving Colors--This activity is set up for whole class, but I think it could be easily adapted for a small group.
Halloween Costume Logic Puzzle
Cookie Monster Problem--Good problem to work on perseverance
Number Icicles:  Skip Counting Puzzles
Would you Rather:  Place Value problem

2nd GRADE:
Sums Investigation--Problem solving activity with sums of two-digit numbers.  
TicTacToe Sums--A game for practicing addition with addends 0-12
Ages Logic Puzzle
Make it Equal--Open Middle problem about equality
Adding Two-Digit Numbers--Open Middle problem with addition
Bubbling Cauldrons: Challenging unsolved problem
Number Icicles:  Skip Counting Puzzles
Would you Rather:  Jellybean Subtraction Problem
Would you Rather: Money problem
Would you Rather:  Place Value problem

3rd GRADE:

Robot Steps--This activity mixes addition with pattern exploration.
Bowl-a-Fact--Challenging activity where students explore number combinations for specific results.
Sam the Squirrel--Story problem which involves multiple steps and strong thinking.  Good for individual or group work.
Tortoise and the Hare Skip Counting Challenge
Would you Rather:  Buying candy problem

4th  and 5th GRADE:

Keep it Simple--Task in which students are asked to state unit fractions as the sum of only other unit fractions.
Fractions Jigsaw--A challenging puzzle with equivalent fractions.
Peaches Today, Peaches Tomorrow--Challenging story problem involving fractions of sets.
Fraction and Rectangles task--DOK problem about equivalency
Open Middle Puzzle for Equivalency
Open Middle Decomposing Tenths and Hundredths
Would you Rather:  Sharing equal pieces of cake


Please feel free to share this with a friend.  If you have other resources that you have found work well, please share in the comments below.

Nix the Tricks--Use manipulatives and strategies to help students understand

One of the biggest challenges we have is to change our thinking about how we teach math. Many of us teach using the same methods and same "tricks" that were used to teach us  because this is how we feel comfortable.   Research shows that we should be working to help our students make sense of the math.  To do this, we need to work to include more concrete examples of problems and to eliminate the teaching of tricks in math.  

I found this great website called Nix the Tricks.  On this site, a high school math teacher explains how the tricks hurt students in the long run.  She also offers a free, downloadable book where she lists different tricks that teachers teach, why they shouldn't be taught, and how we should be teaching instead.

I am constantly looking for good manipulatives to use in the classroom.  This document has a list of some virtual manipulatives that can be used in all classrooms K-5.  As kids get older, we sometimes think we shouldn't be encouraging manipulatives anymore, but that is not usually true.  All students need to go through three stages with a concept: concrete, pictorial, and abstract/numerical.  They will all be in each stage for a different amount of time, so most 5th grade classrooms will still have kiddos who need to use manipulatives to help it make sense.

That's what we want.  For it all to make sense.

Share these resources with others that you think might benefit.  If you want some help with putting some of these things into action in your classroom, please let me know!

October means Halloween

Check out these SMART Notebook docs for some fun review this month!  Because multiple grade skills are covered--use the pages that work for you!

Grades K-2

Grades 3-5

Please feel free to share with a friend.  I didn't make the really cute K-2 one; I found it and just made a few edits.  :)