Decorating Christmas Trees

What if you had three Christmas trees and a lot of decorations? How would YOU divide the ornaments between the trees? The students all solved this problem in different ways. Check their blogs for their solutions. (We were inspired to solve this problem by other classes talking about this on Twitter.)

Practicing Math

One of the ways we practice math concepts is by playing math games. These games help to reinforce concepts and stretch the students’ math thinking.

Whether it is subitizing (the ability to know, without counting, the number of objects in a familiar grouping)…

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…or counting on from numbers…

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… it’s always more fun if it is part of a game.

Geometric Shapes

Lots of geometry learning has been happening in our classroom lately.
First, playing Guess My Shape with a classmate…

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Then the same game with 3D shapes…

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And today, we played the game with Ms Lirenman’s class via Skype.

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Lots of great conversations using terms like curved, flat, edges and corners.

100 Days!

We’ve been working together in our classroom for 100 days. That calls for a celebration!

First, we thought about what we wondered about 100.

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Then, we started on our list. One of our projects today was making a hat with 100 tassels. It sure takes a long time to count and attach 100 strips of paper…

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We didn’t get to try all of our wonders yet, but we’ll keep working on them throughout the week!

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Guess My Number

Our class is playing a game of Guess My Number with a class in Milan, Italy. Because we can’t use Skype (they are finished school for the day before we start), we are asking questions and answering them on Twitter. If you are on Twitter, can watch our game by searching for the hashtag #guessmynumber.
We are getting better at asking “fat” or “juicy” questions that help us to cross off several numbers at once.

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Connected Measurement

Yesterday we had fun playing with measurement while we connected with Ms Lirenman’s class in Surrey, who are learning the same things we are. The emphasis in both of our curriculums is on comparing items using words such as longer, shorter, heavier etc.

First, someone in our class and someone in Ms Lirenman’s class each picked an item which we showed to the other class via Skype. Then, we randomly picked a card to see whether the winning item would be longer or shorter. The students decided which class had the longest or shortest item. (Sometimes each class had to measure with a ruler to know for sure.) We kept score and fortunately, our classes were tied at the end of this game!

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Then, each class moved a balance scale in front of the camera, and the children took turns showing two items. Everyone in both classes predicted which item would be heavier by putting both hands on their head for one item or in their lap for the other. Those who were unsure could put one hand in each place. Some of the items were surprising!

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Mystery Number

Ms. Lirenman’s class in Surrey, British Columbia, is also learning about numbers up to twenty, so my class challenged hers to a mystery number Skype. We chose a number between one and twenty and they tried to guess what our number was by asking questions that could be answered with a “yes” or a “no”.

Their first question was, “Is it nine?” They were right!

Then we tried to guess their secret number. We had previously played the mystery number game in our class, so we knew some “fat” questions to ask such as “Does it have two digits?” but sometimes the temptation to ask “Is it four?” was just too much to resist. Finally, after lots of work eliminating numbers, we guessed it. We also let them have another turn because they were finished their turn so quickly the first time.

Mystery Number Skype

We had fun learning with your class, Ms. Lirenman! We hope we can do it again soon.