My favorite way to begin math block at the beginning of the year involves focusing on fun math activities, building students’ confidence, and learning about growth mindset, all in the same task. Dr. Jo Boaler of Stanford University has done amazing work in this area. Her website is youcubed.org. I especially love the Week of Inspirational Math activities, which can be found HERE.
As of right now, there are four sets of Week of Inspirational Math tasks (since 2015), but the 2019 set will be posted soon. You could use one week’s activities as is, or you could check out different years’ activities and put your own combination together. The videos and activities are engaging and students get very excited about math, which is always a great way to begin!
Before jumping into academic content, I also like to set up my math block time with some common expectations. Teaching students to work together and talk about math is an important goal for me from day one. I found this activity on Sara Van Der Werf’s site and I want to try it this year. She describes using it in middle school and high school classrooms, but I think it could be easily adapted for elementary school as well. I’ll let you know how it goes!
I like to survey my students about their attitudes toward math at the beginning of the year. I like to use this survey from Donna at Math Coach’s Corner.
If you have been reading my blog for any length of time, you know I am a big fan of reading aloud to kids! So it will be no surprise to find that I love using picture books in math as well.
Here are some of my favorite math read-aloud books:
~One Hundred Hungry Ants — a great introduction to multiplication arrays
~Amanda Bean’s Amazing Dream: A Mathematical Story – another good introduction to concept of multiplication.
~Each Orange Had Eight Slices — this book helps model the associative property of multiplication. A good follow-up would be for students to write their own multiplication stories.
~Six Dinner Sid — a cute story about a cat who visits six homes, eats six meals a day, and has six different owners. A twist in the plot causes a change in Sid’s life! Kids enjoy this book and it can be used for multiplication stories as well.
~One Grain of Rice: A Mathematical Folktale – a story with a great lesson and illustration of concept of doubling.
~Snowflake Bentley – another great story which can lead to mulitplcation stories using multiples of three and six.
~365 Penguins – another fun book with lots of possibilities for problem solving.
~Sea Squares – introduces the concept of square numbers
~The Doorbell Rang – my all-time favorite book for introducing (or reminding) students of what is happening when we divide numbers.
~A Remainder of One – a good book for showing division with arrays.
~The Great Divide: A Mathematical Marathon – another book with great possibilities for division stories and using halving as a strategy.
~The Warlord’s Puzzle – introduces tangram puzzles and can also be used for fractional parts.
~Grandfather Tang’s Story – same as The Warlord’s Puzzle
~Full House: An Introduction to Fractions – a fun story that introduces fraction concepts.
~The Wishing Club – in this book, four children wish upon a star but are granted wishes in fractional parts that follow a pattern. Several extension activities are listed at the end of the book.
~The Lion’s Share – a great story with a message and lots of fraction concepts, along with multiplication and division. If you ever read the Aesop fable of the lion and the mouse, you will want to use this book during math.
~The Greedy Triangle – a great review or introduction to various geometric shapes. Plus, if Marilyn Burns wrote it, you can count on it being a great math resource!
~Perimeter, Area & Volume: A Monster Book of Dimensions – this book is new to me, but I plan to use it this year to help review area and perimeter and then introduce volume.
~Sir Cumference Math Adventure stories – kids love these! There are a variety of concepts covered in different books.
~The Librarian Who Measured the Earth – a wonderful biography of Greek philosopher Eratosthenes who did accurately measure the globe’s circumference.
~G is for Googol – a Math Alphabet Book – a variety of math concepts are introduced in this fun alphabet book.
~any books by Greg Tang – these are fun and engaging.
~Round Trip – kids LOVE this book. I always use it during a geometry unit. It is illustrated in black and white. You basically read the story all the way through, then turn the book upside down and read the rest of the story. I know that’s confusing! Here’s the blurb from Publisher’s Weekly:
“A visual stunner….The format is wonderfully inventive–once the traveler arrives in the city, the book is flipped over and read back to the beginning, with the black-and-white pictures taking on new meanings….Sure to delight and fascinate.”–Publishers Weekly.
*Donna at Math Coach’s Corner has an awesome site with engaging math resources that are easy to implement. HERE is her post about structuring math workshop and her tips for getting started.
*Curriculum Corner is another website with specific lessons for getting your math block started. You can easily modify these lessons to fit your class’s needs.
*Achieve the Core is another good site with Common Core-aligned resources. I like to use their mini-assessments throughout the year as quick checks on specific standards. HERE is a link to their assessments, which can be filtered by grade level.
*Some sites with fun games for your math block:
~NC Department of Public Instruction’s math site HERE. Click on your grade level and find games aligned to standards.
~K-5 Math Teaching Resources
~Curriculum Corner Math – Grades 4-6 resources
*Some of my favorite books about best practices in math instruction:
~Becoming the Math Teacher You Wish You’d Had: Ideas & Strategies from Vibrant Classrooms by Tracy Zager
~Mindset Mathematics by Jo Boaler and other authors
~anything by Marilyn Burns
*Some of my go-to math websites:
3 Act Math Tasks
Estimation 180
Table Talk Math
Math for Love
Math Coach’s Corner
Not Just White Dude Mathematicians. I have nothing against “white dudes”, but it’s great for students to see that mathematicians look like them or their friends! Representation matters.
Robert Kaplinsky
Numberless math problems
3 Read Math Problem protocol
Open Middle
Number Rock math videos
Math Antics math videos
Flocabulary math videos
Marilyn Burns
Sara Van Der Werf
K-5 Math Teaching Resources
Curriculum Corner Math
I hope you found a few ideas to try this year! Let me know what you tried and liked and please share your own ideas!