The Common Core State Standards in Mathematics is really emphasizing number lines in student work with numbers. So I thought I’d include one on a What Do You Notice? Poster at last night’s Family Math Night event. But in order to reflect both the primary and intermediate grades, not only did I include the counting numbers, but I marked the fourths, as well. Some students noticed the color pattern I used – even numbers are blue and odd are red….
So for this What Do You Notice? poster, I decided to tie in rectangular arrays with prime and composite numbers. That said, whatever math-y thing students notice is totally acceptable. For example, one student noticed that the “buildings” had square windows. Great. That’s a little bit of geometry. Another student noticed that each set of colored rectangles included the same number of squares. Again, great, as that required some counting and comparison. Just like the student who noticed that there are…
Get kids excited about science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics (STEAM) with this fun hands-on collaborative project. Typically done during a Family Math Night event, this project can also be done in the classroom. The best part is, each person is individually represented in the final product! Students will learn what makes a soccer ball through an introduction to 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional geometry. The lesson plan includes the mathematical background and useful vocabulary along with a link to the video…
Here’s my latest What Do You Notice? poster from a recent Family Math Night event. The nice thing about these posters is that they’re open-ended which allows for anyone to respond. For this one, I decided to make a venn diagram. But I didn’t draw the usual circles. Instead I drew two hexagons. This created the rhombus (parallelogram) in the center. The categories I used for the numbers were even numbers and multiples of 5. That said, anything appropriate would have…
I hired my youngest son, Ryan, for the summer. When your kids get older they don’t hang out with you as much so we have to find ways to keep them around. I find money works. :-)But hiring him was really a win/win. He needed a job and I needed help. So he’s been keeping track of the hours he’s worked and every couple of weeks we square things up. Yesterday he reminded me that I owe him $100 for…