Not a box! One of my favourite books is “Not a box” by Antoinette Portis. I love it because it reminds me of my own children who refuse to let us throw out boxes. They have all these great ideas of what the boxes can be turned into and although the mess drives me nuts, I'm always … Continue reading Not-your-usual-shape Lesson!
Author: @seeanngo33
Ordinal numbers are anything but ordinary!
The other day, a Grade One teacher asked me to do a demonstration lesson on ordinal numbers. She wanted to see how I would approach it. I had to think for a moment because I have never explicitly taught ordinal numbers. Usually, by the time students get to me, they’ve already learned them. I just … Continue reading Ordinal numbers are anything but ordinary!
Odds and Evens
I went and asked a few Grade 5 students to tell me about odd and even numbers, and this is what they said: Student A: “3 is odd, 2 is even” Student B:“anything ending in a 0, 2,4,6,8 is even and anything ending in a 1, 3, 5, 7, 9” is odd. The students told … Continue reading Odds and Evens
Coding for Kindergarten!
You can hardly get through the week without coding appearing as a headline in the news somewhere. All the big companies are getting involved with coding initiatives and all of the governments are supporting coding with their own endeavours. Here are a few examples: “Google to Donate $190K To 'Black Girls Code' Initiative” "Microsoft Releases 'Minecraft' … Continue reading Coding for Kindergarten!
Story time in math class!
I love teaching math with stories. Not only do I value the authentic nature of solving math problems from books, I love how quickly they can engage a whole class. I find it so rewarding when a child makes the connection between the story and the math involved. I taught with a book the other … Continue reading Story time in math class!
Digits versus Numbers
Rory was playing the Osmo Numbers Game (he was pretty spoiled by Santa this year!), and he was getting really frustrated because the game wanted him to make the number 12, and he kept doing 1 and 2 (instead of 10 and 2) and not getting it right. This led me to wonder how I … Continue reading Digits versus Numbers
Representing numbers
Rory was writing out numbers the other day and some of them were backward and all I wanted to do was tell him that they were backward and that he should fix them. Instead, I bit my tongue, and silently thought “positive feedback, positive feedback” in my head and then said, “Good job, I see … Continue reading Representing numbers
Full STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math) ahead!
THE DISCOVERY This past summer, I bought Rory a YOXO Helicopter construction toy (for only $10 at Chapters!). As soon as we got home, he was dying to dig into it, but I said no (...after watching Shonda Rhimes' TED Talk I might have answered differently)! I wanted him to wait until I had time to … Continue reading Full STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Math) ahead!
All things are not created equal!
All things are not created equal...including the understanding of the equals sign! Did you know that Americans have a very poor understanding of the equals sign, especially when compared to students in other countries? “Ninety-eight percent of the Chinese sample correctly answered 4 items indicating conceptions of equality and provided conceptually accurate explanations. In contrast, … Continue reading All things are not created equal!
What the heck is a rekenrek?
Never heard of a rekenrek? You’re not alone, but I’m here to tell you, it is one of the best manipulatives for developing number sense in early primary, and you can make it yourself! Originally developed in Holland, it looks like a mini-abacus, but functions quite differently. Although you can have many rows in a rekenrek, … Continue reading What the heck is a rekenrek?
Math Milestones with my little men 