DreamBox Learning®» classroom activities

Tuesday Teacher Tips: Grocery Store Ads

Lisa W — Tue, 04 Jan 2011 17:48:22 +0000

Welcome to the Tuesday Teacher Tips series! Each week we’ll highlight teaching and learning resources, ideas to use in the classroom, as well as things to ponder as you go about your teaching day. Recently, I've been saving copies of the weekly grocery ads, the multi-page flyers that come in the Sunday paper. They work great to teach and reinforce so many real-life math skills. Collect enough for each student in your class; none have to be the same. Estimating Tell the class that you are giving them a budget of $5.00 (or $1.00 or $20.00…). Ask them to look through their ad to see what they can buy without going over their allotment. Explain that they can’t write any of their problems on paper; it all has to be done using mental math. How did they figure out the problem without writing down the equations? Did they estimate to the nearest dollar, quarter, or dime? Now have them figure out the exact answer. How close was their estimate to the exact answer? Comparing numbers Assign students to cut out five items, along with its price, from their ad. Next, ask students to arrange the items by cost from least to greatest. Then have them glue their items on a piece of construction paper. Display the posters in the front of the room to use during a class discussion. What costs more, a head of lettuce or a can of soup? Which costs less, a bag of candy or a box of cereal? How did you know which was the smallest and which was the greatest? Calculating totals and figuring out change Tell the class that they can buy any two items in their advertisement. Have them write down the items and calculate the exact cost of the purchase. Now tell them they are paying with a five or ten dollar bill. How much change they will receive? What is the fewest number of coins that the cashier will give them? Do they have money left to buy anything else? Multiplication You can easily have the class multiplying or doing repeat addition with grocery store ads. Ask students to find the cost of a pound of hamburger. How much would it cost to buy five pounds? How much would ten jars of peanut butter total? Measurement The ads give students the opportunity to discover how different items are sold: individually, by the pound, by the bunch, by the package, or by capacity. How is it is stated in the ad so they know the way it is sold? When is the metric system used and when is the standard system used in the grocery store? What are some everyday materials you use in your classroom? Please share, we’d love to hear about them.

Tuesday Teacher Tips: Activities to Reinforce Math Vocabulary

Lisa W — Tue, 30 Nov 2010 17:12:08 +0000

Welcome to the Tuesday Teacher Tips series! Each week we’ll highlight teaching and learning resources, ideas to use in the classroom, as well as things to ponder as you go about your teaching day. Our November parent and teacher newsletters focused on developing math vocabulary. Below are some more activities to use with your students. A working math word wall After you’ve introduced a word, put it up on the word wall and refer to it often. It lets the students see the written word and incorporate it into their reading vocabulary. Throughout the day, if you catch a student correctly using a word that’s on the list, put a sticker next to the word. This encourages students to use the words again and again in their daily conversations. “Wanted” flyers To highlight math vocabulary words that have multiple meanings, have students make flyers titled, “Wanted for Math.” First, create a bulletin board titled, “Also Defined As…” With the class, brainstorm math vocabulary words that have multiple meanings. For example: similar, even, odd, multiply, factor, prime, face, and power. Each student chooses a word and writes it in the center of their paper in big, bold letters. Around the word they should write the many definitions of this word, as well as pictures to illustrate. Vocabulary posters After students have had learning experiences to understand the concepts and ideas behind new vocabulary, have them create posters to illustrate the meaning to teach others. This will get them thinking about not only what a word means, but how can it be shown visually for someone else to understand. For example, they might write the word liter inside a picture of a liter of soda. Display these throughout the school to highlight your students’ math learning. If you’re looking for examples to show the class, check out the Mathematics Word Wall developed by Michele S. Weiner, Regional Center II Instructional Supervisor. The document published by the Broward County Public School has visual representations of 35 key math vocabularies. What activities do you use in the classroom to reinforce vocabulary? We’d love to hear about them.

Tuesday Teacher Tips: Valuing the Wrong Turns

Lisa W — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 17:00:30 +0000

"Mistakes are the portals of discovery" - James Joyce

There are many times when driving to a new place that I’ve gotten lost. Temporarily this is always an inconvenience, especially if I was already running late. But when this happens I pull over, take out my map, and locate my current location. The next thing I do is figure out where I was going and how to get there. It’s during this process of stopping and reevaluating that I usually realize where I made the wrong turn. In the meantime, I’ve learned a whole new part of the city that I never knew before. And the next time I’m in this neighborhood I can easily navigate, since I’ve learned from my experience of errors. Every year I share this with my students. Recently, my class was working on three-digit subtraction that required regrouping. I put a problem on the board and gave them time to solve it. When they had finished, I invited students to demonstrate and explain how they solved the equation. As he listened to one his peers, one student in the room gasped, “Oh! That was my wrong turn!” I could almost see the big cartoon light bulb flash above his head. He volunteered to explain his mistake and told the class what he learned for future problems. I believe that the most valuable learning experiences are our errors. The journey that takes us on winding paths and wronged forks in the road sometimes gives us the needed tools for future problem solving and makes the end destination of understanding so much sweeter. What stories from your life do you share with your students to help them in their learning process? We’d love to hear them!

Funding Opportunity: Target Field Trip Grants

Tracy H — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 16:44:36 +0000

School budgets are tight, and every dollar helps! Teachers who are interested in taking their class on a field trip, but don’t have the budget should check out the latest funding opportunity from Target. Target will be awarding 5,000 grants of $700 each to schools for the upcoming year. Winning teachers can use the grants to fund a school field trip that connects their curriculum to out-of-school experiences. If you’re interested, apply today for a Target Field Trip Grant – the deadline is September 30, 2010! What field trips have you planned or gone on that tied your student's curriculum to an out-of school-experience? We'd love to hear about them, especially if your field trips relates to math learning. Share your experiences on our blog by commenting here, or on our Facebook page!

Building A Classroom Community

Neal M — Mon, 13 Sep 2010 16:33:45 +0000

As a teacher myself, one of the most challenging times of year is September (or even August for some teachers!) when everything is new. Teachers need to establish classroom routines, set high expectations for students, establish rapport with families, and get started on academics as soon as possible. For myself, the most important aspect of starting a school year is establishing community. To me, community can mean school, classroom, link to families, even a community of colleagues with teachers and support staff. Here are some strategies I've used to help build community right off the bat!

Let your students dictate much of the community building. This can include student decisions on classroom guidelines, decorating their own space, setting up class libraries, creating and assigning class helper jobs, and more. Most years, I have students submit their own classroom floor plan options, and the class votes on a design best for learning. We reassess the design after a few weeks and make changes if necessary. Giving your students ownership over their learning environment has enormous benefits down the road.
Create consistent messaging to center your school year. This can be a class credo or manifesto, simple statements to drive home important aspects of your class, or quotes and sayings applicable to the school year. One year, I used the messaging from the book Fish by John Christensen, who observed the employees at Pike Place Fish Market. This had double meaning for my students, being so close to Seattle ourselves. Just this past year, our classroom message was "Professional, Powerful, Personal" and all students knew these were our three goals. Our work, our attitude, our behaviors all worked toward these three simple words.
A classroom can be a second home to both a teacher and students. Find design elements in a classroom to make it comfortable for both you as a teacher, and for your students as well. In past years, I've had shelves of toys and stuffed animals that students are free to use as a fidget or a comfort for those difficult days. Allow students to find ways to make your classroom comfortable! Research shows that any way we can lower a student's anxiety level leads to better academic performance. I noticed one year that my students performed better with soft, focused lighting. How many of our classrooms blast students with thousands of watts pouring out of commercial lighting! Try to create a themed atmosphere, one year my classroom looked similar to a classic library, with small lamps on desks and small groups of study areas.
Get rid of your "teacher space" and join your class! This is always difficult for me as a teacher. However, I've found that I do my best teaching when I'm in the same space as my students, and do not retreat to my teacher area. I have seen teachers remove any aspect of a teacher desk, and simply pull over another desk to a group of students. Try it for a week, see if you can go a whole school day staying away from a "teacher space" and really engage with your students. They will appreciate that you are on their level, and you may just prefer it as well!

This list is by no way comprehensive. What ways have you found to start your year that gets everyone started on the right track? Please share your ideas with us!

Make Every Minute Count With Classroom Transition Time Tips

Sue — Thu, 09 Sep 2010 14:05:35 +0000

Our DreamBox teachers talk about how they work to find creative ways to make the most of every moment in the school day. And because transition times can sometimes be chaotic, they look for ways to engage students and keep them focused when moving from one activity to another. So the DreamBox Learning teachers have shared these engaging activities to help keep students focused during classroom transition times. Here are a few suggestions, and you’ll find even more ideas in a new DreamBox printable: DreamBox Transition Time Tips. Transition: Leaving or entering the classroom Activity: Double Up Greet students when they come in the door with a deck of cards (without face cards). Show each student a card as they enter and ask them to double it. As a variation, give students 2 cards and ask them to identify which is more (or less) or whether they’re equal. Once you’ve done this several times with the class, have your students take turns leading the activity. Transition: Snack time Activity: How Much Snack? Arrange students in pairs or small groups with counters available. Before students may have their snack, have them do some math! Put the day’s snack in a container. Tell students how much each child should have. Before eating the snack, ask your students to predict if the container has too much, too little, or the right amount for everyone. Allow students to “deal out” the snack one at a time to see if their prediction was correct. Any transition Activity: Beat the Clock For a week, have students take turns timing how long it takes to do various transitions (lining up, cleaning up, walking to a specialist class), and keep track of the time. Want more suggestions? You can download the printable with these and more transition time activities for teachers!

Say What? Small Child, Big Word

Tracy — Thu, 12 Nov 2009 21:01:05 +0000

How many kids want to be paleontologists when they grow up? Or can even pronounce the word? This little one wants to be a paleontologist because paleontologists "study bones." And then he goes into a spiel about paleontologists finding a "really big bone". No bones about it, this video is adorable! Watch it below. Good luck future paleontologist! Time is running out, so enter our Dream Big Kids Contest before it's too late. Remember, if you're a teacher you can enter your classroom and try to win the $1,000 cash grand prize or a 1-year free DreamBox Math Classrooms for 24 students.

Contest video spotlight

Valentine's Day Math

Beth — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 14:41:24 +0000

Who says Valentine’s Day is only about Hallmark and sugar? Classrooms can find creative ways to expand this holiday into a great learning opportunity. Try having your class send a valentine to their favorite number! This can be a great thing to put up on a bulletin board for the day of the big party.

Have students think about a number that they like, maybe their favorite number. They should create a card with this number displayed prominently on it. For primary classrooms, it might be handy to have giant numbers to trace onto red paper. Their writing can go anywhere on the number. Older students will invariably come up with a way to make the number pop out on the front.
Students should write a little letter telling why that number is special to him/her. It would help to elaborate on what its uses are, mathematically speaking, and reasons why that number was picked. Students can write all the ways to make that number on the front, with any mathematical expression they can come up with that equals that number.
Decorate and discuss. Allow a little time for some fun decorating. Doilies are basic V-day décor, but crayons work great too. It is always important for students to share with others about their work. Save time and have each child share one thing about their number as you staple each valentine up on the bulletin board.

Here’s a Valentine's Day Math example

(It gets a little cheesy, but this helps the kids to see the fun in it!) Happy Valentine's day number 9, I really like you. You are my favorite number. ‘NINE’ has 4 letters in it just like my name, Beth! I like that you’re 3 x 3, since 3 used to be a favorite number of mine when I was little. Now I’m older, so I’m just as happy with bigger numbers like you. I also like that you look like a 6 upside down. You’re the square root of 81 and you make really cool number patterns on a hundreds chart when you’re multiplied by other numbers. You’re also the largest single digit that I know. Happy Valentine’s Day, number 9! Sincerely, Beth