Coin you help?

**I would love to have first and second grade teachers weigh in on this topic.**

So there has been a lot of talk throughout my school and district about 1st grade CCSS in math.  Specifically, the conversations have been around money targets or lack there of.  Oregon standards always had 1-3 math standards that focused around coin values, as well as operations with coins; the CCSS do not.   Now that Oregon, and the district I work for, have completely adopted the CCSS, second grade teachers are concerned that students will be coming to them with drastic math holes.

So I ask you...what do you do as a kinder or first grade teacher to introduce or teach coins? Second grade teachers, what do you want students to know about coins before they enter your classrooms?

I have been adding coin activities to my centers throughout the year, but I have done very little direct and guided instruction around the concept.  I decided that needs to change.  I want to start incorporating more money concepts into my math messages.  The amazing Janaye, from Tales of Frogs and Cupcakes found some great videos and songs that review coins and their values.  (Be sure to check out the link).  I also purchased this amazing mini unit from Second Grade Stories:

I can't wait for my students to use these puzzles and games to continue to solidify such an important concept.
What do you do as a primary teacher to introduce such an important concept, while making time to teach EVERYTHING else?

Be sure to check out other magical mathematical conversations over at I Heart Recess.

Don't forget to swing over to my TPT store for my birthday sale.  My entire store is 20% off.

Math Monday - Balancing Equations

I am linking up with Jess, from I Heart Recess for today's Mathematical Monday.

It is crazy to me that first graders need to be able to balance equations.  Don't get me wrong...understanding the equal sign is vital; so is fact fluency.  Due to the fact that fact fluency is even a struggle, I knew my kiddos were going to need of as much practice with balancing equations as possible.  Specifically, CCSS 1.OA.D.7.
We did several lessons experimenting with an Equabeam (math balance).  If you are not familiar with this amazing tool, I highly recomend it.  It allows students to build and balance number sentences.

After practicing as a class, students practice their skills with Balanced Equation Memory and SCOOT.

I am always so proud of my kiddos when they go and get tools because they know exactly what helps them.
Throughout the lessons, I saw a lot of growth with equation and equal sign knowledge, but they still need more practice.  Lucky for them, it is a center this week.

All of the activities that I mentioned above can be found in Find the Balance.  

What is a difficult math standard for your kiddos to master?

Base-10 Basics

This past week, we jumped right back into the swing of things.  Thanks to EverydayMath's spiraling curriculum, my students were finally introduced to base-10.
I love launching new concepts with an exploration.  I busted out our base-10 bin and allowed students to "play" with the manipulatives first.  I truly believe that student need time to handle and play with tools before being asked to learn with them.  After students explored, we met on the carpet for an introduction of base-10.  We learned about the value that each tool holds.  Students then took a bag of base-10 tools to their seats and began creating numbers.

Of course, we wrote on our tables with dry erase markers!  I was thoroughly impressed with how quickly students picked up this concept.
In hopes of solidifying the concept even more, we read A Place for Zero, by Andeiline Sparagna LoPresti.  It is a fabulous tale of the number zero and how it searches for its place in Digitaria.

Do you have any great tools and activities that have worked for teaching base-10?

DINOmite Math

I am convinced that math centers are the greatest part of my students' day.  Just like literacy centers, they have the entire week to complete each center.  Every week there is a center aligned to each of the following categories: Data and Measurement, Facts, Operations, Numbers, and Geometry.
As a way to support these categories, I created a new center pack.  My boys love it...it's dinosaur themed!

Leave a comment below, with your email address, for a chance to win this pack.

Launching Measurement

I LOVE launching new math units!  First grade is filled with so many foundational math skills, measurement being one of them.  I have learned that understanding measurement takes a lot of hands-on practice, with a variety of units.
ENTER...

Nonstandard Measurement!

They even measured me!

This was such a fun and powerful lesson.  After just this one day of practice, 80% of my students are consistently using correct units when documenting their measurements!

How do you launch measurement in your classroom?

Math Monday - Fact Practice

A student's ability to recall their basic facts is still one of the most important skills they must master.  I love providing opportunities for students to practice this skill during math centers, as well as whole group.
I have been using Leigh's Just the {Basic} Facts during math centers.
My firsties love the fact families and doubles activities.

We recently brainstormed different ways to make the numbers 1-10 and then completed the adorable Number Craft.

This activity lent itself to perfect differentiation.  The anchor chart, created by the students, shows the variations in students' number sense.

Be sure to check out Leigh's pack, as well as what other teachers are up to through the Math Monday Linky!

Math Monday - More Pinterest Inspiration

In my quest for balance, I decided to take a mini-break from the blogging world.  I missed it like crazy and am ready to share some of the incredible teaching and learning that I have been a part of recently.  I am linking up with the incredible, Deirdre, from A Burst of First, for today's Math Monday.

Recently, I have taken a step away from our district adopted math curriculum to build the foundational skills that I know my students need.  I decided to search through my pin boards for number sense and fact fluency ideas, and BOY-OH-BOY did I find a ton of great ideas.

It was hard to determine just where to start, but after some organizing I decided to create a few sets of Power Towers (I am super bummed that I can't find the original source).  This activity was very simple to make and has been a hit.

I picked up an enormous back of Dixie Cups from Costco and got to work.  This set is made up of +1 and -1 facts.  I simply wrote the facts on the bottom of several cups.  To make them self-checking, I added the answer inside of each cup.  That is it, well at least on the prep end of things.
My kiddos now use them during math centers.  If they correctly answer a fact they can use the cup as a building piece to their tower.  If they answer the fact wrong they can ask a buddy for help or place the cup at the bottom of their stack and try again.  It is so incredible listening to them whisper their facts and get excited for how tall their towers are.  I can't wait to introduce the sight word Power Towers this week.

I would love to hear about a math activity you use to build fact fluency.

Math Monday - Connect4 Make10

This year, I began incorporating math centers into my daily math routine (previous post).  I have had so much success with them and it seems to have become my students' favorite part of the day.  I have been wanting to incorporate some different forms of fact practice and thought this idea would be the perfect fit:

Connect4 Making10
  

I was able to find Connect4 on sale at Target, so I picked up 2, and got to work!

The game came with 2 bags of discs, but I only needed 1 for the math game.  I wrote the numbers 1-4, and one 5 per color, on the discs.

The object of the game is to get 4 in a row and create a sum of 10.  You can definitely create variations of the game, but I wanted to make it challenging for my high fliers.

 No win here because there are only 3 red discs in a row, even though the sum is 10.

 The yellow discs won by creating a sum of 10 with 4 in a row!

I decided to use the other bag of discs to create a collaborative word work game.

 For this variation, students use their discs to create as many words as they can together.  When no more discs are left, students count up how many words they were able to create together.

You can see 3 words in this game already: hat, best, and web.

Be sure to check out what other teachers are up to, through A Burst of First's Math Monday Linky!

Don't forget to enter my November Giveaway for your chance to win The Ugly Pumpkin, by Dave Horowitz and my mini unit.