Superhero Secret Skills Review for Primary Students

I know I am always looking for Secret Skill Review for my Primary students.  I have found that if you wrap your review in something SUPER, students tend to do their best because they are having fun!  Here are some Superhero Secret Skill Review ideas!  

Addition and Subtraction Skills

Students will have a SUPER time proving what they know in addition and subtraction.   These pages are a great way for kids to both prove what they know and take a brain break to color either at the beginning of the year or, even, at the end of the year!  Super Secret Skill Review at it's best! 

Sight Words

Sight Words are a jumping spot for reading.  These Super Secret Skill Review Sight Word pages are super simple to use!  Just print and go!  The best thing is, they can be used as Morning Work!  Then, they can be used to assess students ability to read the words! Two in one!  Win-Win!!

Direction Following

This one!  How often do we get a chance to see exactly what students can do with direction following.  These Super Secret Skill Review pages can give you a clear idea of what students can really do with direction following.  They read each step and follow those directions provided.  From this, you can see exactly what your students are capable of, whether it is at Back-to-School time or the End of the Year!  Super easy to use too!  

So, as you can see, these Super Secret Skill Review pages are a great way for students to show-what-they-know and for you to get the information you need to assess from them!  LOVE IT!!  Let me know what you think by dropping me a comment here on the blog!  And, you can join me over at Instagram and Facebook to keep up with my journey there!  I'd love to have you follow along!  

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Rounding Numbers to the Nearest 10 and 100 for Mastery and Fun

Rounding to the Nearest 10 and 100  is one of the most basic skills presented to students-honestly, kinda boring too!  What if I presented to you the idea that it can be a lot of fun and kids can master it too!  No, really, it can be FUN and mastery can be done in just one week!  

How to Make it FUN!  

Find a good theme and go with it!  Seriously, rounding to the nearest 10 and 100 needs a theme!  That's how you make it FUN!  Luckily, a theme has been made!  May I present to you...Knights of the Rounding Table!

This fun rounding unit is set to the idea that the King needs help-and the queen steps in to save the day with an idea-an idea that defeats the Digits Dragon!!  So fun, right!  

How to Make it MORE Fun!

When I do this Rounding to the Nearest 10 and 100 unit, I accompany it with some fun information about knights and dragons!  Read a great book about Medieval times (I have an oldie but a goodie that is so old, I can't even find it on Amazon to show you the book!)  Or, even better, about King Arthur!  Or Saint George and the Dragon which is an amazing knight story!  (Grab this freebie from Scholastic!) 

This literature tie in makes it even more fun because students can dive into the topic in a different way-tying in this new information to apply to the math concept!  It builds a fun new experience all around!  Plus, you could even have them create a fun Digits Dragon on their own!  This adorable craft would make a great tie in to this unit!  

What about the Rounding?

Students get the opportunity to learn rounding to the nearest 10 and 100 from simple steps to the practice of mental math!  Students start with learning the Rounding Poem.  This poem helps them to remember the concept of rounding down for under 4 and rounding up for 5 and over.  Plus, the posters have clues to help them remember too!

Students will first practice rounding to the nearest 10 and 100 by identifying the ten or hundred before and after the original number.  Then, students must decide, based on the rounding rules, which number it is rounding to.  This allows students to build the foundations of the mental math to come.  Next, student step into the mental math realm to round to the nearest number.  Both rounding to the nearest 10 and 100 is taught on separate pages.  

Once the skills are mastered individually, then students are presented with rounding to the nearest 10 OR 100 on one page!  This way, students can practice this skill in tandem with one another, switching their brains back and forth!  Plus, they can play a fun game! 

 This super fun game presents the students with the opportunity to defeat the Digits Dragon!  And, then, students can prove their mastery with a quiz!  

Best of all, then they are KNIGHTED!  Imagine their excitement to receive their official Knighthood after learning both rounding to the nearest 10 and 100 AND Medieval Knights!  It is just so exciting to them!  

So, as you can see, rounding to the nearest 10 and 100 can be both a learning opportunity and fun!  And, everything you need can be found in this product!  Your students will love it and so will you!  I'd love to hear what you have to say or your ideas about rounding to the nearest 10 and 100! And, if you would like to learn more about what I do in my classroom, I'd love for you to join me on my Instagram journey and over at Facebook too!  


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Multiplication Mall to Prove Multiplication Strategies Success!

It wasn't too long ago that multiplication was a rote memory skill-one that simply included memorizing to "know" your multiplication skills.  Now, multiplication is about understanding-and that is a huge improvement upon just knowing the facts by heart!  So, what would make it even better?  How about a project that includes proving multiplication strategies success!  That's what Multiplication Mall does!  

The purpose of Multiplication Mall is to prove multiplication strategies through designing a "store" in the mall.  Each part of the "store" provides evidence that a student understands a particular skill in multiplication.  Let's break this down!  

Starting the Project

Students need some foundation with the basic of this multiplication project. This is where brainstorming comes into play.  Work as a class to brainstorm the type of stores that are found in a mall to get their creative juices going.  You will also need to work on learning about alliterations.  Luckily, there are posters within this product to guide your students with alliterations!  

Assigning the Project Steps

Next, students will dive into the project itself.  Provide the rubric to students along with the Planning Page.  This is where students will make critical decisions about what their store will "sell".  A rough draft like this allows students to make mistakes BEFORE they get to their final design.  It is critical to allow this because it builds in success in the final product!  

Students will also work on the posters that hang outside of their store.  Both the windows and the posters are designed to prove multiplication strategies that students know.  To help guide their choices, there are also posters representing each multiplication strategy that students can choose from.  Once all of this is designed, students will then get the teacher's approval to move forward into the final design stage! 

Completing the Project

Students will need bulletin board paper and construction paper to complete this project.  You will need to cut the bulletin board paper, also known as butcher paper, to the size that students need.  This needs to be large enough to fit the piece of construction paper that will house the windows on.  You will also want to have white paper cut to design the posters also.  Once this is done, allow students the chance to create!  Step back and watch what they will do, you will be amazed!  

Final Thoughts

Projects are about proving what students know.  Allow students to self grade their projects will give you insights beyond what you can learn by grading them yourself.  It is a relatively easy process.  Give students a yellow highlighter.  Let them work through the rubric, examining their work to best judge themselves.  Then, once they turn it in, grade the project with a blue highlighter!  Anywhere the teacher and student agree, it will turn GREEN!  How cool is 
that!  

Allowing students to prove multiplication strategies for success is an easy way for you to show that students have mastered the standards of multiplication.  But, it is more than that!  It is a way to provide a creative, fun way for students to show what they know!  Grab it in my TpT store!  And, let me know what your ideas are about proving multiplication strategies in the comments!  I'd love to hear!  

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Student-Led Learning-Go for It!

Welcome back!  If you're here for the first time, welcome!  I am on an experience where I'm Inservicing Myself during my summer break on Student-Led Learning.  I have been moving along by reading an amazing book called Fearless Learners by Christy Sutton and Kristin Westberry!  Be sure to check out some of my other posts!  

Today, we are looking at Step 3:  Let's Go!  Both Sutton and Westberry share a number of personal stories about their beginnings, what kids said and did on those first days.  There were some amazing stories and successes within the text, which all pointed to the following-CHARACTER QUALITIES!  Student-led learning is not all about just learning about school work, it is also about developing students who can problem solve and think about others.  I'm being brief here because I would like to back up a little and give you some background and ideas of my own to share.  

In 2003, I started doing something with my students that I can now clearly see was student-led learning.  I was above the curve and now realize I could have made a million dollars if only...Now, I say that laughing, but, it is a reality.  In 2003, I started doing student-centered math, today known as Guided Math.  It was so amazing to see 5th graders rocking their own learning.  What happened to stop me from making a million-other teachers!  You see, after seeing the following student-led characteristic, not only myself, but a fellow teacher, saw the HUGE impact it was having.  Students took risks, students helped each other, students were remediated immediately, student test scores went up, and students were leading their learning in many of the same exact ways both Sutton and Westberry are sharing.  I can tell you 100% this works, especially in math!  So, with the encouragement of that teaching friend,  I presented at a district level inservice to...crickets.  No reaction, no support, in fact, the opposite.  I was told by primary teachers there was NO WAY they were going to teach math more than once a lesson!  I was told there was NO WAY they would use manipulatives in small group!  I was told by intermediate teachers there was NO WAY they could just let their students work on pages they already knew and move ahead!  NO WAY!  So, I closed my door and did it-and, then,-stopped!  High stakes testing got higher, Common Core math craziness stepped in, and I stopped!  Poof-million dollars gone (and now went to someone else!  HA!)  

What I do know is that all of the character qualities discussed in Let's Go can and will develop as I step back into this mode of learning.  That's where I'm starting again-math!  So, I have a few pics to share and a product or two also!  

What my student's rubric page will look like at the beginning of the year. 

How my students will chart their work across time (Ignore the red.  That's work I have to do!)

First, I will say that I've decided not to use the terms found in Fearless Learners for my classroom. They use scales as the term that they use with students.  I have always called what they call "scales" as rubrics.   I will not be able to retrain my brain to call them anything but rubrics!  

I've also decided to call the guiding page a Unit Overview.  Again, this is what my district calls our teaching tool, so I feel that it is implanted enough in my head to call it that.  Needless to say, you can call these tools what you would like.  There is no "set" terms to go by, because, we are all different!  Here is one of the things I've whipped up for sale over at my store:  

This product is a simple way to keep your kids on track to develop a game.  11 different game boards are in this product with or without cards to match the board!  Print and Go-all you need to do is put them in files for easy student access!  

As I learn more and more, my brain keeps going to the possibilities of this model!  Let me know what you think about this model and the possibilities in your room!  I'd love to hear!

Project Based Learning: Shedding the Light on Area and Perimeter

This year's testing anxiety, both in students and teachers, is OVER!  Thankfully!!  However, so is my math book!  Yes, I know! Years ago, a math book was viewed as a holy grail in teaching.  It was, literally believed, that if you finished your math book there was something wrong with you!  You went too fast or taught too little!  Your students didn't master the  material!  Because, honestly, that's what math was all about-mastery!  In our high stakes testing systems, it is now about production line work!  Get it done-faster, incomplete, and without mastery-or your test scores will suffer!  Many times, we do our quick little "project" based questions at the end of the chapter and call it a day!   They "really" shed a light on what kids know, right!  (I can hear you laughing now!)

So, with the dilemma of no more 3rd grade math to teach and a number of weeks still at hand, I set forth on a quest to really "see" what my kids really knew about area and perimeter with this gem-Build a Park Project!

Let's start with what I really thought shall we!

Misconception #1:  
This will only take a week!

I figured the kids would whip out the required elements and the poster, and poof-done!  Now, the reality is, I was a little bit crazy when I thought this!  I've done tons of project based learning.  I know better!  But for some reason I was totally wrong about this one.  I had safely given them 5 days to plan and 5 days to "build".  I quickly realized that the planning was the deeper problem in this activity.  This leads to misconception #2.

Misconception #2:  
My students know how to use the formulas for area and perimeter!

HA!! Now I can laugh at that!  From my brightest to my struggler, they were just counting.  Over and over again, just counting!  We had completed lessons, we had used the formula.  It didn't matter-JUST COUNTING!!  This was quickly evident when none of them KNEW the formulas, even though we had just finished the chapter about a week before!  JUST COUNTING!  This was eye opening!  When we assume from a chapter that they get it, we are doing just that, assuming!  Our biggest struggle came with perimeter.  They could quickly adapt to the area formula-length x width- but the perimeter was a whole different thing!  They relied so much on counting that they didn't even know what numbers to add!  Yep, major misconception on both of our parts!

You can see the planning stage here.  This is where counting took place, from their rough ideas. This led to many problems in calculating using the formulas.  

Misconception #3:  
Required elements are required, right!

I have completed projects with my students that had required elements.  They were successful at that!  In math-it was like a whole new idea!  I had kids creating things with ZERO required elements.  Once I started checking here and there, it was like a lightbulb went off!  I had one student who had to scrap her whole project because they didn't understand that the list I went over and specifically said they needed was, well, required! So, this was another eye opening thing for me!

I worked with this student to adjust some "required" elements because they clearly knew the math on paper but just "missed" the idea of what "required" meant. 

Misconception #4:  
"Doing" the math will be easy.

When you are looking at basic adding and multiplying, you would assume that these are easier skills that students can complete.  However, this is a crossing over of skills, making it more complex.  This means that divergent thinking had to mix with convergent thinking (a concept I am currently reading about in a book called Make Just One Change.)  This cross over meant many easy mistakes being made.  Could they pull the numbers they need and then make them equal to what they "THINK" the area or perimeter was.  They wanted to draw squares instead of use lengths and widths in their drawing.  That meant skipped squares or unequal rows and columns.  That equaled FRUSTRATION!  Nothing that couldn't be solved, but they just couldn't "see" how the error in their drawing made the error on the math page.  Very enlightening I must say!

This shows that this student did not connect the area formula of 6 x 5 = 30 to how it should be correctly modeled.  

Misconception #5
Presenting an idea will be easy with the R.A.F.T. method, after all, that's what it is for! 

If you have never heard of the R.A.F.T. method,  you are missing out.  This easy to use writing strategy is a fun way to motivate students to write.  The have a R. role, A. audience description, F. format  for a topic to be written as, and T. the topic to be written about.  I motivated them with this idea:

Yet, I got everything from a minute of sharing which sounded blah to a full fledge sales pitch.  The R.A.F.T. did motivate them, but I did not give enough information for all kids to really get it!  So, I got wise. While kids were sharing projects, I jotted a few great ideas I heard and, with that in mind, created a guiding document to help the students next time!  Here are some of the great ideas I heard from their presentations:

        *Share the name of your park (obvious, yet missed by many)
            *Include the theme of your park and why it is that theme
            *Share important locations and how they can be enjoyed by "guests"
            *Include a reason to invest in your park-what are the best qualities?
            *What is the price range to invest in your park?  (This is a great practice in place value and
              the value of land, etc.

This was one of the projects that had a full sales pitch as well!  

That about wraps these misconceptions up!  It was truly an enlightening thing to do.  The BEST moment of this entire experience was when my true math struggler made a HUGE connection between the formula and the shape, something this student had missed all along, even when counting. This student had that sudden light bulb moment where they literally went "OHHH!" when writing out the perimeter formula!  This child also scored the best they have ever scored on anything in math because other qualities emerged.  Their ability to give a good presentation, the detail they put into the project that others did not, the pure success this child felt all became a key component in the end result.  It truly reminded me of the reason why we must be do projects in math-and it will spur me on to find more!  

So, here it is!  

As you can see, this project is fun and informative for both the student and the teacher.  And, you get everything you need to complete this project and assess their work.  It really is an amazing project that I am so glad that I completed with my students and hope that you will complete with yours!  Let me know what you think by adding a comment too!