Coins Needed

We will begin studying money this week. To make this study more meaningful and realistic I’m asking each student to bring in a collection of coins in a labeled baggie (first name, last name, teacher’s name) to use in class. I will store the coins each day for your child to use when it is appropriate. 

Please send in:    (A total of $4.20)
6 quarters
15 dimes
20 nickels
20 pennies

It is also beneficial to have some spare change around the house to practice identifying the coins, adding and subtracting using the coins, and making up word problems to solve involving coins.

Thank you for your assistance.  If you have any questions please feel free to write a note in the agenda, call or email.

Ms. King

Ways to Represent Equations

Today we created a very cool resource that your child will bring home to share with you.  It is a representation flip book.  We drew a model for several of the ways we have to represent problems.  Ask your child about these representations and when they would be reasonable to use or ridiculous to use.  Students were asked to keep this resource in their take home folders so they can use it at school and at home.  We will be adding more to these on Monday.  Please make sure your child brings this back so they can participate on Monday.

 

Have a happy weekend!!!! Go RAVENS!!!! :)

 

 

Classroom Volunteers

We're ready to work with volunteers!

I've set up a sign up at VolunteerSpot.com

Here’s how it works in 3 easy steps:

1. Click this link to go to our invitation page on VolunteerSpot: http://vols.pt/4Um8UJ
2. Review the activities listed and choose the one(s) you like.
3. Sign up! It’s Easy — you will NOT need to register an account or keep a password on VolunteerSpot.

Note: VolunteerSpot does not share your email address with anyone. If you prefer not to use your email address, please contact me and I can sign you up manually.

Please check the site and sign up for the days you would like to volunteer.  Times may be added or changed so please check weekly to see if anything was added to a time/day you're available to help.

Happy Volunteering!

~Ms. King

Video Resources for Problem Solving

I have a few more resources to share with you!!!!

Our math supervisor, Don Hicks, has created 3 videos modeling some of the math strategies and representations that we use in our classroom.  Please take a moment to look at these ways of solving problems that your children are using.  Ask your child to model a problem for you as well.  They would love to share their knowledge of what we are doing in the classroom.  Please click on the link below for more information.

Another video resource we have available is on our Unit 2 homepage.  As you scroll down the page look to the left and you will see some clickable images.  These images are linked to short lesson connected to the Common Core Standards that we are teaching.  You will also notice that attached to some standards are student resources.  These connect to webpages that have resources or games matching the standard.

In class we will be making some resources to share our strategies for solving and a variety of ways we can represent problems.

Happy problem solving!!!

- Ms. King

Problem Solving {10.28.13}

Today we worked on solving problems together focusing on beginning, middle, and end.  After reading each situation we went back and checked our work using beginning, middle, and end just like we do in ELA.

Here is the problem we started with all together:

 

Here's what we came up with...

 

 

 

We first read the problem.  Then, we reread the problem circling important Beginning, Middle, and End information.  We then came up with the situation equation and several ways to represent or prove our thinking.  Finally, we recorded our solution.

 

Here's what the students came up with for their independent work...

 



 

 

 

Look for this paper in your child's homework folder.  This will help them with this week's homework problem solver.

 

 

Happy Monday,

Ms. King

 

 

 

Math Strategies Resources

Here is a link to some fact strategies.  Click on the image below to view the website.

 

 

Math Fact Strategy Guide:

Addition and Subtraction

(based on Teaching Student-Centered Mathematics, 2006)

 

An efficient strategy is one that can be done mentally and quickly.  An efficient strategy is most useful to students when it is their own, built on and connected to concepts and relationships they already own.  When students do not yet own efficient strategies, implementing premature drill and/or timed practice introduces no new learning and encourages students to resort to inefficient practices (such as counting on fingers).  Premature drill and practice is a waste of time and frustrating for students.  The vast majority of instructional time spent on math facts should be spent helping students to develop efficient strategies, and then learn to select and retrieve appropriate strategies based on the math facts to be solved.  Brief daily strategy development instruction (5 minutes a day) is the best contributor to math fact mastery.  Every student should be required to understand each strategy; however different students will adopt different strategies for the same collection of facts. 

Addition Strategies
Strategy	Example	Explanation
One-/Two-More-Than (Counting Up)	6 + 1 2 + 6	Count on from six.  *As students count on from the larger addend instead of counting all, they are ready to practice this strategy.  This strategy can be extended to three-more-than, however students may have more efficient strategies for these facts.
Zero	7 + 0 0 + 4	Seven plus zero is still seven. *Some children may overgeneralize the idea that addition answers are always bigger than the addend. This strategy is a good time to address this misconception.
Doubles	2 + 2 7 + 7	*These ten facts (0+0 through 9+9) are fairly easy to learn and serve as anchors for many other facts.
Near-Doubles   OR   Using Doubles	4 + 5 6 + 4	Double the smaller number and add one. Compensate addends to double the middle number (6+4=5+5) *Some students may also double the larger number and subtract one.  This strategy may be extended to doubles plus two or three.
Make-Ten   Or   Using Ten	9 + 2 (Think 9+1+1) 8 + 3 (Think 8+2+1)	Start with the larger addend, build partial sum up to ten, then add on the rest. *Before using this strategy, students should own a variety of ways to compose and decompose 10.

 

As students learn and apply addition strategies, related subtraction facts should be addressed as a part/part/whole relationship.  If “think-addition” is to be used effectively with students with subtraction, it is essential that related addition facts must be mastered first.  Research shows that children learn very few, if any, subtraction facts without first mastering the related addition facts.  If children are not thinking addition, they are most likely using inefficient practices such as “finger-counting” or “head-bobbing” to count.

 

Subtraction Strategies
Strategy	Example	Explanation
Subtraction as Think-Addition (selecting and/or combining appropriate addition strategies)	9 – 4   14 – 9     15 - 6	*Students must previously own efficient strategies for related addition facts to use this strategy effectively. What goes with four to make nine?   Build up through ten: Nine and one more makes ten and four more (makes five) to get up to fourteen.   Back down through ten: Fifteen take off five gets you down to ten and take off one more to get to nine.

 



Taken from CCPS Basic Facts Resources.

Unit 1 Math Test this Wednesday and Thursday

Happy Monday!

Students will bring home their data binders tonight.  Make sure you take a look at how they are doing with their facts and Unit 1 information.

This Wednesday and Thursday we will be taking our CCPS Unit 1 Math Test.  Please use the following information to help your child study.

Thank you for all that your do to help your child with their education.  It truly shows in the classroom! :)

 

Unit 1 Math Test Review

Use the papers that have been sent home along with the papers in your data binder to help you review for the Unit 1 Test on Wed/Thur.  Click on the blue links to see a practice sheet for each skill.

Review

1.     Word problems

provide a representation (drawing or visual model such as a number line or a ten frame)

solve it – write an equation (specific to the word problem), use a symbol for the unknown, choose the correct situation equation from those provided

2.    Create a bar graph to organize data.  Then, answer questions using your bar graph

3.    Number lines – show adding and subtracting on the number line

4.    True/False equations – be able to prove that an equation is true or false by showing your thinking (work).

5.    Know a variety of ways to make a given number (addends to equal 10, 11, 12, …)  We have done this several times in class as a warm up.  The children really love this activity.

6.    Fact strategy sort