Skills Block Practice

I have never seen students so excited as they were today! They were on fire for learning their Spelling Words and their Vocabulary Words. What could have brought about this excitement you are probably wondering? Games, games, and more games! If you want to see for yourself what I am talking about, I challenge you to check out these websites, sit down with your child, and experience the excitement of learning. We thank our very own Zane for demonstrating how the games work. He loves to practice his words by playing these games.

For Spelling practice, go to: Spelling City
For Vocabulary practice, go to: Quizlet

Make sure that you write a comment, and let us know what you thought!

Addition and Subtraction Strategies on the Rise

On a recent math homework assessment, our students showed us some fantastic strategies for finding sums and differences. Here are a few of them:

FINDING SUMS

Solving 27 + 14

Zane's strategy of Decomposing into Tens and One

Zane decomposed 27 into 10+10+7 and 14 into 10+2+2 and then used "left to right" addition to combine each of the partial sums.

Nathan's strategy of Compensation for Addition

Nathan subtracted three from the 14 and added three to the 27 to make a "simpler" problem: 30 + 11. By making the first addend a landmark number (30, a multiple of 10), he created an additon problem that could be solved using "mental math".

Camden's model of an Open Number Line for Addition

Camden begins at 27 on her open number line and then makes a "jump" of 10 to get to 37 (mental math problem), and another "jump" of 4 to get to 41.

Franchesca's use of the Traditional Algorithm (Regrouping) for Addition

With this strategy, Franchesca adds from "right to left". 7 + 4 is one "group of ten" and one "one" (11). Leaving the one "one" in the ones place, she then "regroups" the one group of ten to the tens place and combines it with the 2-tens and 1-ten that are already there.

FINDING DIFFERENCES

Solving 74 - 36

Morgen's use of the Open Number Line for Subtraction

Morgen starts at 74 on her open number line and subtracts 36 from 74 in five stages: 10, 10, 10, 4, and 2. This moves her back 36 on her open number line. Her ending position (38) on the number line represents the answer to this problem: 74 - 36 = 38.

Tekiyah's use of Compensation for Subtraction

Tekiyah subtracts six from both the minuend and subtrahend to "make the problem simpler". In subtracting the same amount from both parts of the subtraction problem, the difference (answer) is not changed (since the "distance" between the two numbers on a number line remains the same). 68 - 30 is a "mental math" probem, whereas the original problem 74-36 is not as easily solved without pencil and paper methods.

Eder's use of "Straight" Subtraction

Eder first decomposes 74 into 70 + 4 and 36 into 30 + 6. He then subtracts his tens (70 - 30 = 40) and then his ones (4 - 6 = -2). Finally, Eder finds the difference in his two partial differences (40 and -2), which is 38.

Caleb's use of the Traditional Algorithm (Regrouping) for Subtraction

Caleb subtracted from right-to-left. He decomposed 70 into 60 and 10 so that he could subtract 6 ones from 14 ones to get 8. This left him with subtracting 3 tens from 6 tens to get 3 tens. With regrouping, it is important for students to understand that the original number 74 (70 + 4) is still 74 once regrouping takes place (60 + 14 is STILL 74)- this decomposition of a group of ten to make ten ones simply makes subtracting in the ones place easier so that the result (difference) is NOT a negative number (compare back to Eder's strategy where, without regrouping, a negative number results in the ones place).

MATH ROCKS and so do our kids' strategies! Be sure to leave a comment noting your FAVORITE strategy when combining and comparing numbers.

Cover 50

Today in our Math Workshop we introduced our first "Game", which the kids really loved. This game is called "Cover 50" and reinforces what we have been learning concerning the relationship between factors and multiples. While playing, students had to think about generalizations of multiples, such as even numbers, "factors", only having even multiples (ex. 4- 4, 8, 12, 16, ...). They also had to think about patterns we have studied, such as the ones-place pattern of 5, 0, 5, 0... in the multiples of 5 (5, 10, 15, 20, 25,...) . As students played, they took turns deciding on a "factor" in which they would cover their board with multiples for that factor (their set of cards) with the object of the game being to be the first player to be able to play all ten of their cards on their Cover 50 board. By studying their own set of playing cards against their partner's cards, they developed strategies for calling out the "factor" for their turn that they would have more multiples of than their partner. This game certainly needs to be played more than once and will now be available at a game center in our room for when students find extra time to revisit it.

Gathering Seed Ideas

Last week during Writer's Workshop, we created a list of thing writers can write about to add to our Writer’s Journals. These topics are called “Seed Ideas”, because like seeds, they will grow…into a story. We gathered ideas by sketching, collecting pictures from magazines and personal photos, writing down our wonderings, and paying close attention to the world around us and listing the things that we noticed. These Seed Ideas may eventually grow into fictional stories, personal narratives, reports, persuasive writing, poems, or functional writings.

Next week we will be focusing on choosing a seed idea for a personal narrative and developing a plan for our story. Personal narratives allow you to share your life with others. Your job as a writer is to put the reader in the midst of the action by letting him or her live through an experience. A good story creates a dramatic effect, makes us laugh, gives us pleasurable fright, and/or gets us on the edge of our seats. It is important that the students choose a seed idea from a personal memory that will develop into an engaging story.

Behavior Buck Challenge:
Students- Do you want to earn 5 Behavior Bucks this week? All you have to do is sit down with a parent and teach them about the parts of your Writing Journal. Then with your parent, choose some seed ideas that may turn into a great personal narrative and post them on our blog. By sharing ideas and reading what others have to say, we will learn and grow as writers. Good luck!

Studying Plants

Our first science unit this year is on plants. In these first seven days of school we have been outside to carefully observe and diagram physical properties of plants in our school garden and we have made predictions about seeds and what they "need" in order to grow. Last week, we participated in an initial lab where we studied seeds and their parts up close using hand lenses as tools, and in a more recent lab we are carefully observing new plant seeds and how moisture effects their growth. Each day, we record our observations in our plant journals so that we can draw conclusions at the end of our investigation. Today, while we are in waiting for our bean seeds to sprout, we referenced our textbooks to learn more about the four main parts of plants, what plants "need" to survive and grow, and our interdependence with them as human beings. While Mr. Pinchot read the text aloud to the class and students followed along in their own student textbooks, Mrs. Phillips created a Concept Map of what we were learning through the reading (see image).

We think plants are fascinating and are eager to learn more about them.

Happy Researching!

Mrs. Phillips and Mr. Pinchot