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If your school is anything like mine, there are tons of activities right before winter break.  It is hard to get anything taught, let alone keep students engaged and behaved.  So this week I decided to just Let it Go!
On Monday, we had Polar Express Day, which is held by our librarian, and we all were pajamas.  We had shortened class periods so we began our Crystal Snowflake Experiment.  I took on the role of a science teacher and we discuss the important vocabulary that would be seen in our experiment.  These words included solubility, solution, boiling point, pore space to name a few.  We discussed what would be occurring tomorrow in science terms.  We also watched a few short videos about solutions and dissolving substances into water. The next day we put our plan in action! I had asked parents to send jars the week before and I had one jar per person.  Side note, the pint sized wide mouthed mason jars as well as the common chip dip jars work the best.  Bigger jars require A LOT of water and A LOT of Borax soap, so if you have extra jars like I did, I just made them trade their jar for a smaller one.  We also used colored pipe cleaners instead of food coloring and it worked out amazingly!
I boiled the water and put the water into the jar.  Students then put in 3 tablespoons of Borax for each cup of water and stirred. Not all the soap will dissolve and that is okay.  We then put our jars in an empty room and left them overnight.  The next day, Wednesday, revealed awesome crystals that students could use for ornaments on their tree!

TEKS 5.8C explains that students will need to be able to move around on the coordinate grid using directions like right, left, up and down as well as cardinal directions such as north, south, east and west.  Thus I created Reach for the Stars! This game was fabulous and the students loved playing!

The partner game required so many different TEKS and standards that it was awesome to see the students work together! First students came up with a starting point, by spinning a spinner.  This is the only time that they will spin the spinner.  Next students drew cards from the bag.  Cards have 1, 2 and 3 step directional movements.  Students then follow the directions.  If they ever pass through a star or land on a star, the students receive the points indicated on each star.  Students record and add up their points on the score board.  I laminated my game boards and had students use dry erase markers.  I gave students two different colored markers.  I also had my students complete an exit slip with STAAR prep questions, and I was amazed at how many students retained the movement concept! If you would like to complete this activity in your class, check it out HERE!

Next week, is our last week before winter break.  My class will be making a Crystalized Snowflake and I have also made an activity called Winter Wonderland! I can’t wait to use this new activity in my class! If you would like a sneak peak, check it out HERE!

Have a wonderful last week (if it is your last week:)
Peace, Love and Math
Jenn

This week we focused on Order of Operations without exponents.  I developed a great activity that allowed students to analyze different problems while looking for mistakes.  I instructed the students that they were human lie detectors 🙂 .  Students determined if the statements where Truths or Lies.  Students worked through each problem justifying why the problem was a Truth and why the problem was a Lie.  They sorted the cards onto the sorting mat which has QR codes to reveal the correct answers.

I love to change up my activities from year to year.  Even though my students did extremely well last year on the state achievement test, I hate to do the same lessons every year.  One reason I try to change it up from year to year, is that students are not the same each year.  Some years are better than others while some years require a different approach.  This year, the students require a different approach.  I have to be very explicit with my directions and expectations.  I cannot assume anything this year.  With that being said, I made some new activities in order to teach this year’s topics to mastery.

As an added bonus, this activity helps their inferential thinking skills, that they need so badly in reading class. Because the questions are written in clues, students must gather clues and decide on which product to use in their solution. 

Download comes with activity sheets, teacher directions and answer key. It also comes with a word doc that is completely editable! You can add your own questions or edit mine! You can make it more difficult or use different product in your own grocery store circular. 

This could be done individually or with partners. You could also put this in a math station! To get your own copy visit my TpT store or click HERE! 

Part of a teacher’s job to get better every year and to get to know your content better every year.  This is the third year of the new math standards and I think this year I have done a ton better with teaching decimal multiplication using models.  Here are some of the activities I used this week.

Well I have survived the first three weeks of school! I have spent about 6 days reviewing fourth grade multiplication and then teaching fifth grade 3 by 2 multiplication using standard algorithm.  I always provide students with a multiplication chart, usually taped to their desks, because I do not want students to lose their standard algorithm process if they get mixed up on a multiplication fact.  As time goes by, student after student moves away from the chart and becomes fluent with their multiplication facts.  This chart also helps with learning the steps of long division, which is what we started this week. Both processes require many steps and focus, so it is good when a student doesn’t have to worry about a fact and can just focus on learning the process.  Last year, when I had to remove the multiplication charts for testing, it was a MESS! I had to break out a razor blade and alcohol to scrape the sticky residue off the desks.  So this year, I used velcro! I laminated the little charts and bought velcro from Amazon and put the charts on each desk.  The velcro charts are awesome! The kids can remove them and take them to small group or just pull it closer to their journals.   Warning- You have to tell the students not to play with the velcro and not to rip it off and on to make noise. What kid doesn’t want to hear that noise? 🙂

WE MADE IT! First week of school is done! In fifth grade we hit the ground running! So this week we focused on graphing.  This is the third year with the new math standards and I am still trying to fully understand the rigor behind the standards.  I think every year I get a little better at the new concepts.  This year during our data and graph unit, I did some of the same things as last year but I added a few new activities to increase the rigor.
First we focused on Stem and Leaf.  We used favorite numbers between 20-49 and we also played SKUNK to collect data in a more engaging way.  Afterwards I handed out a laminated piece of manilla paper with a stem and leaf graph in the middle.  I divided the paper into four sections.  Each student in the group was responsible for writing a question that could be solved using the stem and leaf.

Welcome back to another wonderful year in 5th grade! I had a wonderful summer break! When I was small, I thought time passed by so slowly.  I remember thinking, how much longer until my birthday, Christmas, summer break etc.  Now I feel like the older I get the faster the time flies, which I find very unfair since when you are older you have many more things you want to cherish and slow down the aging process. But alas, here we are beginning another school year.
I am very excited about the kids that are coming to us this year.  I helped out with fourth grade math last year so much that I already know a majority of the kids, so that feels amazing!
Last year, our fifth grade team had outstanding STAAR scores! In Math we had 100% of our students pass math with 48% of the students scoring in the advanced range (first Admin).  In Reading, we had 98% of our students pass and 38% of the students were advanced (by 2nd admin).  In Science we had 100% of our students pass with 30% of the students scoring advanced! Just amazing!
We owe it all to data driven lessons and assessments.  Towards the end of the year I really focused on student driven data and allowing students to be more accountable for their own learning and goal setting.  This is what drove my students to the advanced levels.  They didn’t just want to pass, they wanted to set their own personal goals and meet those goals.
This year it is my goal to start this from the beginning of the year.  I have created a student friendly version of all the Math TEKS so that students can keep track of their own strengths and weaknesses.  I will have them glue these pages into their math journals for easy access and reflection.

I will feature this data sheet and a new data activity featuring Pokemon Go soon! Have a wonderful first day of school!

Peace, Love, Math- Jennifer

I cannot believe it will be February next Monday! Where has the time gone?!
This week I had the pleasant surprise to be featured on the front page of my Arlington ISD newsletter!  I love being able to share my ideas with the world (which is why I do this blog incidentally).

Happy New Year and welcome back to school! It is so tough coming back from the holidays.  I just got to the point where I was able to stay up late and wake up after 9am.  Then BAM, back to the routine.  At least we had fun when we came back!
Our focus this week has been on adding and subtracting fractions with unlike denominators.  I first had to review equivalent fractions and mixed/improper fractions because my pre-test data revealed that my students had forgotten these concepts from fourth grade.  Out of 68 students only 5 students remembered how to solve problems related to these concepts from fourth grade.  That is too many students to small group, so I had to shut down class for a couple of days to reteach concepts.  That was last week, since we only had a three day week.  This week we focused on the new concept, adding and subtracting unlike denominators.
I really do not agree with teaching students to cross multiply to find the new common denominators and then simplify after adding and subtracting.  This method works but is not the most efficient method.  I teach students to find the least number the denominators have in common.  This reduces the chance of having to simplify after adding or subtracting.  In my opinion, finding the least common multiple is more efficient in the long run.
First we explored the concept with fraction pieces and journaled the math that went along with the manipulatives.
The next day we played Fraction Musical Mix-Up!
This is a little different then the traditional musical chairs.  I do not remove chairs and no one is ever “out”.  It is more of a Dance Around, Pair Up and Solve type of musical chairs.  First, I assign every student a new name.  Their new name is on a label and it is a fraction.