G.R.I.N - Getting Ready in Numeracy

One of my tasks over the past few weeks has been to design a new literacy and numeracy support program for my school. I have done heaps of research on programs currently being used in Victorian schools and actually got the opportunity to go and see some of these programs in action.

Today I want to talk about GRIN, also known as Getting Ready in Numeracy, a program designed by Peter Sullivan and Sue Gunningham. The GRIN model seems to have some positive successes in the different schools I have been in contact with. The model follows a format in which students are withdrawn for 15 minute sessions prior to their numeracy lesson. The focus of these sessions is on the language of mathematics. Students work on reviewing what they have learnt in their maths classes and then the GRIN tutor quickly addresses some of the concepts the students will be learning that day in their math classes. This in turn gives students greater confidence in their maths classes as they will already have heard some of the terms and understand the concepts the teacher is teaching. 

More information on the GRIN program can be found here: http://education.monash.edu.au/research/projects/grin/elements.html

I would love to hear some feedback on what other schools are doing for their literacy and numeracy support programs! This is just one of many that are out there achieving success. Essentially, my goal is to make sure that these students become more confident in their classes and are able to come out with the basic fundamentals that will help them achieve success. 

Renaming Whole Numbers

When teaching place value, I believe that it is truly important that students are able to rename a number. If they can do that, it shows the students' understanding of the number. 

Here is what I mean by renaming. My example number is 253. 

Students should be able to identify that 253 can be represented as:

253 ones

2 hundreds 5 tens 3 ones
2 hundreds 53 ones

25 tens 3 ones

As a challenge for my upper primary students, I asked them to rename whole numbers of six and seven digits. I organised this activity as a challenge between groups; the group that was able to rename the number in most amount of ways won. One point was allocated for every correct renaming of their numbers. 

Although at first, it was a bit of a struggle, once groups got into it, they really impressed me with their skills. I also was able to see that some students need to work on their spelling on larger numbers. This was a great activity though to truly identify which students full understood place value.

Place Value Poster

This idea is from Runde's Room's Interactive Maths Journals. When teaching whole number place value, I created a place value columns poster based on Runde's idea. The slight difference is that I added the place value houses as I believe it is an added teaching tool for place value.

I used this poster when working with small groups to help them read and recognise whole numbers up to six digits. My students eventually made their own posters and we were able to have small competitions with our posters. In small groups, I would read a number to the students and they had to create the number with their number pullouts on their poster. Other teachers in my area have used the place value posters in their maths class as well with great success. It is an easy poster to create and you are able to model so much with it. Definitely worth the time creating it!

Decimal Poem

http://pinterest.com/pin/169236898469148083/

I found this on Pinterest and loved it. It is definitely worth sharing.While teaching decimal place value, students often get confused with how to read decimals. Although I teach using place value columns and houses, sometimes it just doesn't stick. So, I found this poem, and even though song is more of a lower primary thing, it worked well for my kids in upper primary.

I highly recommend using this when teaching decimal place value. Whenever a student would read a number incorrectly, I would just point to the poem and students were able to self-correct. 

An excellent tool!!!

Pirate Place Value

I found this wonderful and creative activity pack called Pirate Place Value (from Frogs and Cupcakes) and absolutely had to use it. My maths class loves to do activities and so I love making maths a "students-don't-think-they-are-learning-when-they-really-are" experience. Thus, rather than just having students do repetitious worksheets, I often use either activities or hands on learning for my lessons.

When learning/teaching place value, students should be able to represent a number in standard, expanded and word form. Here is a cute and fun activity for students to represent a number in all three ways. 

Build a Number

This is a great activity to test students knowledge of place value and decimal numbers. Although a few of my students struggled with this activity, many others were able to "step up" to the challenge and took their time to work out each problem.

A really good way to have students manipulate numbers and use the same digits to create decimals and whole numbers. I will definitely use this again!

Woolworth's Teaching Decimals

At one of the EAL (English as an Additional Language) professional development workshops I attended last year, the speaker discussed how useful "junk mail" could be for teaching maths. She had us look at a flyer for a local grocery store and come up with different ways of how it could be used in our maths class. Going on this trend, I decided to use a Woolworth's flyer to create an application activity for decimal place value, addition and subtraction. 

 

I can always tell the success of a lesson based on the engagement level of the students in my class and throughout this activity, all students had their heads down and were working diligently with their partners. First, they were asked to find the prices of ten different items in the flyer. Next, they had to organise the items from the most expensive (number with the greatest value) to the least expensive (number with the lowest value). The third thing students had to do was purchase as many of the items as they could with a $10 budget. This required students to both add decimals to create a total and subtract decimals to see how much money was left in their budget. 

A very simple activity to create and students were able to improve their skills with ordering and comparing decimals as well as decimal addition and subtraction!

Creating 3D Shapes

As an application activity for 3D shapes, our maths class created their own 3D shapes with marshmallows and toothpicks. I was surprised with how talented my students were with quickly creating numerous 3D shapes. 

Once the students created their 3D shape, they had to identify the faces, edges and vertices of that shape. Each group had to create as many different 3D shapes as possible. This activity was extra engaging as all students were able to participate. A rich learning task where students could enter at their level allowed every student to participate and work together in a group. This task also allowed me to see which students were easily able to identify edges, vertices and faces, which students could identify them using concrete materials, and which students still needed additional help with this. 

At the end of the lesson, we were able to put our 3D shapes up on display and it was great to see how proud our students were of their work. 

I Have, Who Has - Place Value

It's been a while since I've posted something on my blog. I guess this past term has just gotten the best of me. So I have tons of items to blog about as it has been an exciting term with lots of learning. 

Here is a quick item but worked wonders! I never knew what these cards were called and always called them "I have, who has" cards. They can be used for almost any topic you want but recently a coworker told me that they are actually called "loop cards" and there are websites that you can create them on.

These loop cards were for teaching place value up to six digits with whole numbers. They required students to read the number in standard form and then read another number in expanded form. Each students has a card and when they here their number called in expanded form, they need to recognise it in standard form and it is then their turn to read out their card. Although it is a bit confusing to explain, it was an excellent diagnostic tool to see where students were with reading and recognising whole numbers up to six digits in both standard and expanded form and being able to switch between both. I highly highly recommend using these as a quick exercise to start off a maths lesson and get students ready for learning. 

Describing 2D Shapes

We have started off our maths topic with "space" and more specifically, looking at 2D shapes. Now my maths group is full of students who are eager and excited about learning, so I thought we could easily zip through 2D shapes and get to 3D shapes. Well, after this week, I have realised that although they can identify 2D shapes, they struggle to describe them or even match the shape to the description. So what do they need you ask?!?! They need to learn some maths vocabulary!

I have created a poster with terms that I think would be useful for them to know to be able to describe the shapes. For this mini-lesson, students will have to match up my visual definition to the term. They next have to use these words in their descriptions of various 2D shapes.

Maths vocabulary is something that is often overlooked but so crucial! There is no way that students will be able to describe something without having the proper vocabulary. So let's see what type of descriptions I will get now!

Perimeter and Area Challenge

Today's measurement task: To construct 4 different rectangles, two with a perimeter of 24cm and two with an area of 24cm squared. 

Students were given these simple instructions and off they went. Some students began to use their knowledge of times tables and recognized how that could help them. Others struggled with understanding the concept of perimeter but used unifix blocks to help them.

And our results during share time were the following:

Definition of Perimeter and Area

My learning coach presented this activity to me to use in the classroom as we are working on measurement. It focuses on the use of a learning objective and summary of learning after the task is complete.

 

As a class, we came up with our own definition for perimeter and area. It needed some prompts and the definitions aren't perfect but they are what the best that the kids came up with and what they will use to remember. When we finished our lesson, students wrote on a sticky note what they had learnt that day and posted the sticky notes in the Summary of our Learning section. 

Maths Vocabulary Posters

The importance of using proper terminology in maths has been proven in numerous studies. Thus, when beginning new units in maths, I also make sure that we come up with a class vocabulary poster. This poster begins with all the vocabulary that the students initially can think of that relate to the topic and as we work through the unit, we add more words to the poster. 

This is also very important for any EAL students in your classroom as it helps them to develop their knowledge of the English language and add to their maths vocabulary. 

Here are some examples from different maths units in my class:

Probability Statements

This activity comes from George Booker's book "Teaching Primary Mathematics"

In the early stages of our unit on probability, students were placed into mixed ability groups and given the following cards. Each card had a statement that could be made in reference to probability.

 

In groups, students had to place the cards on a probability scale in order from 100% chance to 0% chance. It was interesting to see their answers and how they interpreted the vocabulary on the cards. Especially "fat chance", as most students thought this meant a big chance. A great diagnostic tool as well. 

Teaching Division using Inverse

I often find division the hardest of the operations to teach simply because I think I struggle myself to simplify it for students. This time around I really tried to break it down and provide students with as many strategies as possible to help them understand the concept.

Our strategies included: vocabulary, sharing, repeated addition and repeated subtraction and we have now moved on to inverse operations.

Repeated addition and subtraction provided a great segway into inverse operations as students were able to make the connection between multiplication and division on their own. It is great when students can make these connections as you see the lightbulb switch in their head.

My students also love making posters in maths, so we rarely do worksheets and take a simple activity and turn it into a 5 star project. So here, I present to you, our inverse posters:

The Day we Measured the Netball Court...

Usually I would be measuring a basketball court or a baseball diamond, but in Australia, we are measuring the netball court! For those outside of Australia who don't know what netball is (don't worry, I was in the same boat when I first arrived here), check this website out for more info: http://www.netball.asn.au/default.asp

So back to my lesson...Today we measured the netball court as part of our unit in measurement. 

Materials needed: 

A trundle wheel

A metre ruler

 

A measuring tape

A notebook and a pencil

First, in groups, students had to estimate what the perimeter of the netball court is in mm, cm, and m. This also tested their conversion skills. Next, they had to measure the court using each type of measuring equipment. 

It ended with students identifying which item (metre ruler, trundle wheel, measuring tape) was the best to use to measure the netball court and having to justify their choice with reasoning. We then compared our measurements and converted again between each unit of measurement. 

And students got some fresh air too!!!

Measurement Scavenger Hunt

A simple activity that focuses on estimation and measurement of length. 

Students were placed in mixed ability groups and each group was given the above worksheet. We ran this activity like a competition between groups. I had a big timer on the interactive whiteboard and when I said "go", each group had three minutes to come up with as many items that would measure to approximately 1cm. We repeated this for 10cm, 50cm, and 100cm/1m. 

This was a good activity to use as a diagnostic to evaluate students' estimation skills. It was also a fun way for students to work together as a team and share their ideas. They were able to develop their estimation skills also through teamwork. 

Once again, I found this activity from NZ Maths and modified it for my maths class.

Division Strategies

My post "Sharing in Division" is about an activity that I use often at the beginning of my unit on division to teach the strategy of "sharing". 

The next two strategies I teach in division are "repeated subtraction" and "repeated addition". My maths class loves hands-on activities so I am constantly thinking of different ways to teach lessons which will keep my students engaged. This strategy could have been taught simply by using a worksheet, but instead, I had students solve their division equations on a sentence strip using a number line.

This lesson was taught over two days, one for repeated addition and one for repeated subtraction. The simple fact of having students complete their number lines on a sentence strip, rather than on a piece of paper in their notebook caused students to stay engaged and focused (and also very excited) throughout this maths lesson. Another thing that is wonderful about my maths students is their excitement when they see their work displayed, hence students put in extra effort when they are completing a task that will be displayed.

For repeated subtraction, students were given a division equation and had to solve it using a number line. They began by drawing the line and started by placing the dividend on the right side. They then jumped backward by the amount of the divisor until they got to zero (hence, repeated subtraction). The number of jumps they made was the answer (quotient) to their division equation.

For repeated addition, students completed a number line again, however, this time they started on the left side of the number line at zero. They then proceeded to make jumps in the amount of the divisor until they reached the dividend amount. Again, the number of jumps they made was the answer (quotient) to their division equation.

 After teaching repeated addition, students made the realisation that "division is like multiplication" which was amazing as it segwayed perfectly into teaching the inverse operations strategy.

Units of Measurement

Learning Focus: Estimating length and perimeter of objects of various sizes

As I've mentioned, my students love creating posters and seeing their work displayed. So today's activity catered to this learning style. Students were given the sheets below that had a number of different pictures of objects on it.

Their task was to create a chart and estimate which unit of measurement (mm, cm, m, or km) they would use to either measure the length of perimeter of each object. They had to cut out the picture and place it in the correct column of their chart. 

This task is related to the Concrete-Pictorial-Abstract approach of teaching maths as it falls directly under the pictorial. The lesson prior to this would have students estimating objects in front of them, and then they move to estimating objects based on a picture of the objects and thus need visualisation skills for this. The next lesson should be estimation based on simply seeing the name of the object without a picture.

Division Simplified

Here is a poster that I make with the children when we start our unit on division. 

It is crucial that students use the correct mathematical vocabulary but sometimes you need to break it down for the students to help them remember what the vocabulary means.

Keeping this poster up and showing 3 different ways to remember the formal algorithm. It is also very helpful for EAL (English as an Additional Language) students in a mainstream class to help them remember the correct mathematical vocabulary and to remember what the vocabulary means.