A teacher friend told me a story that I thought I would share with you because of the way she capitalized on a mathematical opportunity. Her Grade 1 class was responsible for leading a prayer service. Because of their theme “We are children of light!”, the principal let them purchase … More Capitalizing On Math Opportunities »
Reflection Questions How might using Big Ideas impact how I plan? How might we as educators help students see things from a proportional reasoning perspective? Do you have a full range of manipulatives appropriate to grade level curriculum in your classroom? Do your students have access to these manipulatives for … More Teaching to Big Ideas – Proportional Reasoning »
Recently I received the following question from a Kindergarten educator: Why do I get the feeling that natural materials are better than commercial ones for math? I do the exact same activity with materials we have in the classroom. Do the students actually learn more about math through the natural … More Natural vs Commercial Math Materials »
With the best of intentions we implement something e.g., a model or graphic organizer and think that this will be the solution to difficulties we are experiencing in the math classroom. In an earlier post I wrote that a challenge with writing is that something “three-dimensional” can often appear … More Be a Problem Solving Detective! »
Please comment and share your ideas! Planning for mathematics can seem like a daunting task, so I thought I would talk a bit about a few things I did as a classroom teacher. I began my planning by looking at the whole year and plugging in special times that happen … More Math Can Be Everywhere! »
