We have been busy, busy, busy over here!
Do you ever feel like at about the November/December mark, you REALLY start to know your kids? Like, especially in math? I mean don't get me wrong, I knew them in October, but now the red flags are going up, ESPECIALLY in math!
I've been relying a LOT on my guided math groups these last few weeks and have been doing all types of re-teaching and differentiating for my kids. If I have to talk about long division and the fact that Dead Monkeys Smell Bad (get it?) one more time, I may need an intervention myself!
So...while I've been doing 'lots of re-teaching, I always feel so bad for my on grade level and high kids, because I don't want to just give them boring worksheets while I meet with the other students. Can you relate? I want to be able to enrich them with the current concepts we are working on.
Many of them have been working on an enrichment division packet (that I plan to blog about in the future). But no joke, they have been BEGGING to do fractions and algebra, and even asked for more coordinate graphs (I swear they aren't sick of them yet). One of my girls in this group goes to additional tutoring outside of school (if you can believe that) and she brags to all of them about the fraction and algebra stuff she's working on. Now, if I could only get all 30 of my fifth graders to BRAG about math like that...
To give my students a break on their "digging deeper" long division enrichment packet, I allowed them to work on some fun fraction and algebra activities during our guided math time!
Here is one table of them. They were pretty pumped and felt extra smart working on algebra!
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| Don't mind the disaster on those bookshelves. What? I can't be perfectly organized EVERY day. ;) |
I made them Cryptogram Christmas puzzles with order of operations and they LOVED them!
AND, I made these ALL student-centered so that I could be left to work with the students that needed re-teaching. Nothing like getting settled with a group to then have a whole clan of kids come over needing your help! Not to mention, I can't be cutting out all these items on top of all the other millions of things I have to do! For those of you that have the time, more power to ya!
Students also worked on some fun fraction activities where they had to multiply fractions in order to decorate a Christmas tree. It helped to drive home the concept of multiplying fractions by whole numbers. Students could see that the number 18 can be broken into 3 groups, and that there will be 3 groups of 6, therefore 1/3 of 18 is 6 (huge and TOUGH concept for many of my kids).
Another group even delved into some measurement conversion work
I LOVE that she used King Henry Died Drinking Chocolate Milk on this!!!! (So they do listen...) ;)
Don't forget to include your on-grade-level and re-teaching students when it comes to playing games and having fun with math as well. Trust me, my kids notice and I know they don't want to feel different or "less than" or dread math everyday because it is another re-teaching lesson with Miss Nannini. Practicing their multiplication and division doesn't always have to be drill and kill. I made these color by quotient and color by product pages to include ALL my kids on the Christmas fun!
All of the above activities are found in my Christmas and Winter Themed Math Centers and Activities {Common Core Aligned}.
**AND!! They come in black and white for those of you unable or not wanting to print in color!
Click HERE to check it out!
As always, a Miss Nannini staple (or so I'd like to believe!) Christmas Coordinate Graphing Ordered Pairs {Mystery Pictures}
*Disclaimer: the festive Christmas scene is NOT part of the coordinate graph. HA! Just an extra bit of love from a REALLY sweet kid!
**UPDATE TIME!
I said this in my last post and I'll say it again, I LOVE YOUR FEEDBACK! I hope you all like the changes I made on the 5th Grade Assessments!?
The next piece of feedback I heard was, you wanted coordinate graphs that had no negative numbers. Well, ask and you SHALL receive!!
Another update: I have been going though all my products slowly but surely to make them better for you. The latest I have updated are my 2nd Grade Data Binders. I have changed the font to make it clearer, so if you've purchased them, go to "My Purchases" and re-download the files! Or, click the pictures below to go to the links!
**To my fabulous followers: the first 3 people to comment on this blog, tell me something fun you're doing for your holiday celebration in your room, leave your email and I'll send you 1 of my Christmas/Winter products of your choosing for free!!