Picture it, Dallas, 1986… going into Toys ‘R Us for a reward with my parents and being the child who was always wanting to learn more, I picked up workbooks and many a puzzle book over being able to get toys. No matter where we went if I was able
In the newly adopted Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) standard 1c for each grade level states, “The student is expected to select tools, including real objects, manipulatives, paper and pencil, and technology as appropriate, and techniques, including mental math, estimation, and number sense as appropriate, to solve problems.” And this standard
Within the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) new standards have arisen to promote the communication of math skills. Common Core Math Practice Standard 3 states, “Students should construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others,” and Standard 8 states, “Students should look for and
Within the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) and Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) new standards have arisen to promote the communication of math skills. Common Core Math Practice Standard 3 states, “Students should construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others,” while the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills Math
Each school year we start with a new group of students and with that new crew we start fresh with working on problem solving in our math classes. I don’t know about you but over the summer it seems as if most of my students always forgot what they had
It’s the first Wednesday of December which means it’s time for our monthly linky – Math IS Real Life!! If you want to see how the linky works, or just want other real world math ideas, check out our Pinterest Board of all the posts so that you can look
The end of the school year is starting to arrive for many of us as every time I open Instagram or Facebook I see teachers who are counting down in some way (mostly counting the Mondays remaining). During this time of the year students are antsy and they want to
When students leave out your classroom door for the day you as a teacher have little control over what they do until they come back to your classroom the next day. How can we help guide students (and parents) to use that time wisely to help fill in gaps that
Last week was all about Changing the Thinking of Students in Math as well as Finding the Gaps to Fill In to strengthen their learning in Math. As we continue to proceed through the series I want to take some time to talk about filling those gaps at school (today)
When I wrote the original post about Changing Students Thinking About Math, I never realized the feedback that I would get. Not only did I receive comments but also had emails and people asking me questions on my Facebook Fan Page. Wow, I hit a topic that people wanted more
How often do you hear from students, “I just don’t understand math.” Or even more, how often do you hear from a parent, “I never got math so Trevor doesn’t either.” I can’t even begin to count in my years of teaching the number of times I heard this. When
First of all, preparing any activities is always better when you have a latte in hand! After speaking with a group of teachers recently about the benefits of task cards in the classroom, I realized that not all teachers use them the same way. I started using them where each
