Math: Guided Groups, Games and Resources

I am eternally making improvements to my practices and today I'm going to continue to share how I'm going about that in math.

See my first post on the topic: An Inquiry Into Math Instruction
 
Guided Groups Binder:

On the front cover I keep a copy of the CGI Math Story Problem Types

 

The very first page is my personal notes from Math Exchanges.  You can pick them up here.  The book is worth every penny!

 

The inside cover is another copy of the CGI problems and my word problem for the week without the numbers written in.  See below for word problem freebies!

 

Here is a page of my notes from a group.  Kassia says that groups should be Flexible, responsive to specific needs, students interact with all kinds of mathematicians.  So this group was created of different types of mathematicians that I knew needed support with language. So during the retelling of the problem I was really scaffolding their thinking to guided them to the kind of retelling I wanted to hear in the future. You can see that as a teacher I was trying to figure out which strategy they were using.  This kind of note taking is almost like taking a running record to me.  I am figuring out what the student is already successful with and finding areas I can support them in.

 

 

This group was formed as an extension on the fly so I don't have a printed problem.  My goal was to help them understand that Mathematicians try to figure out what they need to do....even if it's tricky.  The problem threw my students for a loop but once they made their initial error they all moved on to try something else, which is another statement we've been working on:  Mathematicians keep trying and persevering.

Here is one way a child solved our tricky problem from above. There's 3 chickens and 2 horses.  How many legs in all?

 

 

This is in the back pocket of my folder along with the articles I posted from before.  It's just a reminder of the phases students go through.  I find that sometimes I want to push them before they are ready so this is my, "Slow down, Jen.  They aren't there yet.  Let them be successful in the phase they are in."

 

 

Here are math story problems for each type of CGI problem that don't have numbers in them (11 in all).  They are great for following Kassia's Math Exchange.  Click on the picture to pick up your copy.

 

Now onto Games!  Really just one game that we play with many different focuses.  It's very simple.  

 

Right now my class is calling this game BOO! because of the holiday.  At different times during the year I change it to relate to the time of year or a topic we are learning about.

 

-Print out numbers on a page like I did above.  Depending on where you are within your standards you could print 0-10 or 0-20.  Print multiple copies to make a TON!
-Cut out the boxes and have the kids help you crumble them all up.
-The kids sit in a circle facing out.  I usually have mine sitting with their white board, marker and eraser for a place to work and solve.
-Spread out the crumbles in the middle of the circle.
-Yell BOO!, the kids will grab some crumbles are begin to solve.
-After they solve the problem on their boards they hold it up.  I use this game as a formative assessment.

There are many, many uses for this game!  Last week they added 3 addends (so they grabbed three crumbles), commutative property, add doubles (grab one and double), and doubles plus one (grab one and add the next number higher). You could also use it for count on, count back, fact families, etc.

Here are some pictures of the game:

Here is the set up.

 

This is when I yelled BOO! 

 Here is the day we did commutative property.  They grabbed two and added.  Then switched the addends and solved again.

Here is the day we were working on Count on.

When they are done they lift them up so I can check them.

 

Here is a copy of the game with a more general theme of Fall:  Go Nuts!  For this game you will yell out GO NUTS!

 

 

 

Resources:

(also on the board are my Math Vocab cards)

Here are my TPT must haves for math-

 

  Stellar Sweethearts' Math Strategy Posters

 

 Brooke Hilderbrand's Addition and Subtraction Key Words

 

  Mrs. Ricca's I Can Posters

 

 

 

And more anchor charts :)

 

 

I hope you all have a fantastic weekend!
Jen