Mathsational

Tic Tac Toe is an easy way to have students work on building fluency and is more engaging than just completing a worksheet.  You could try this activity with either of two different approaches. The first option is  to treat the game sort of like bingo.  Each player would have a board, questions are chosen one at a time.  Every student solves the problem and marks the solution on their game board if they have it.  Play would continue until one player gets 3 in a row.  I wrote about an activity like this here .  The activity was made to help students practice graphing linear inequalities. The other option would be to play the game more like Hollywood Squares.  Students take turns choosing problems to solve.  If they correctly solve the problem, they win and color in the corresponding square until they get a certain number of squares in a row.   Here is an activity that I created with this format.  The activity was designe...

This year I've taken on the #teach180 challenge.  The challenge is to post one tweet per day showing a glimpse inside your classroom.  I'm also putting the tweets together in a biweekly blog so that I can share the resources that I'm tweeting about. Day 61:  Today was a quiz day.  I give cumulative quizzes on each fifth day of class.  However, next week I'll be skipping the cumulative quiz in favor of a benchmark test to help my students prepare for midterms. Today is another fun filled quizzing/grading day #teach180 pic.twitter.com/MfiPBgM3ph — Jennifer Abel (@abel_jennifer) December 1, 2016 Day 62:   Today in geometry, we practiced using properties of parallelograms with a chain activity.   Here is a link to the activity if you'd like to give it a try.  I wrote about this type of activity here if you want more info. In #geometrychat : properties of parallelograms with a "chain" activity (the answer to each question tells which Q to...

This practice structure involves solving problems with quick mental math and comparing solutions.  I have found several math war games online and played them with my students.  Whether solving 1 step equations with pre-algebra students or practicing unit circle trig values with pre-cal students, my students always love this game. This year I played this version of war to review exponent rules with my algebra 2 students. Here are the directions that I used for the exponent rules version of war. I will be playing  this  version by  Kate Nowak  soon to practice mental evaluation of logarithms.  If you have other ideas for using war in your math class, please share.  I'm especially interested in geometry and algebra activities.  

This year I'm taking part in the #teach180 twitter challenge.  The challenge is to post one picture from your classroom each day of the school year.  I am also writing a biweekly post to share the resources that I tweet out. Day 51:  Today was a quiz day.  I give cumulative quizzes every fifth day of class.  On this particular quiz, I had quiet a few students attempt to simplify a fraction by "canceling across addition or subtraction."  I need to reinforce this again obviously.  I've tried doing simply arithmetic examples and showing how the fractions are not equivalent.  Any other ideas on how to show students that this does not work? #NeedARedStamp "can't cancel across +/-" #teach180 pic.twitter.com/KBKH9A91H5 — Jennifer Abel (@abel_jennifer) November 10, 2016 Day 52:  Today in geometry we started reviewing for midterms.  The exams are about 2 months away, but I'm starting to build in a review activity several times per wee...

The next practice structure that I'd like to share is Slap It!  This is a variation of Slap Jack.  This activity works best for practicing skills where there are a limited number of responses.  I've created a version for identifying the center and radius of a circle from an equation and a version for identifying the sine, cosine, and tangent of angles.  I think this would also be a good way to practice evaluating simple logarithms or specific values on the unit circle.  I'd love to hear what you would do with this idea.  Please share any variations that you try. Here are the rules for Slap Jack provided by Bicycle Cards : Object of the Game:  The goal is to win all the cards, by being first to slap each jack as it is played to the center. The Deal:  Deal cards one at a time face down, to each player until all the cards have been dealt. The hands do not have to come out even. Without looking at any of the cards, each player square...

This past summer, I started writing a series of posts about practice structure that I use in my classroom.  These structures are meant to take the place of worksheets.  Worksheets can be a great opportunity to practice skills and build fluency, but they are deathly boring. Here are some of my past posts on this topic: Chains Tarsia Puzzles Board Games My Ship Sails Error Analysis Color By Number Old Maid Today I'm writing about another practice structure that I like to use, Go Fish! Go fish works well for problems that are relatively quickly solved.  I have kids deal the cards and solve the problems in their hands before starting.  Then they ask something like "Do you have the pyramid with a volume of 24 cubic centimeters?"  or "Do you have the solution 24 cubic centimeters." Like many of the other children's games that I use in my class, students really like this activity.  There is a nostalgic feeling for them and they genuinely end up ...

This year I've taken the #teach180 twitter challenge.  The goal is to tweet one picture from your classroom each day.  I'm also blogging bi-weekly about those tweets/activities. Day 41:  Today was a quiz day.  I give cumulative quizzes on every 5th day of class as part of standards based grading/teaching/learning.  This response made me particularly happy.  I learned about CPM's Giant 1 a few weeks ago.  I used it this year to teach simplifying radical expressions and students picked up the idea faster than ever! So close. Glad I learned about the CPM great big giant 1. #teach180 #alg2chat pic.twitter.com/oHFfY2OBrI — Jennifer Abel (@abel_jennifer) October 27, 2016 Day 42:  Today in geometry we practiced triangle proofs again.  This will probably be never ending with  frequent revisits all semester.  Proofs are something that my students find 1) boring and 2) difficult.  Any one with solutions to those problems, I'm ...