Back to School Fun

We've been doing lots of fun stuff since school has started back and I'd like to share a few of those fun things with you! First, Math can be a pain for some kids. I like to spice it up and play lots of games and do lots of hands on stuff. I think I mentioned a few weeks ago about the marshmellow place value idea, but are some pictures of that activity.





Another fun Math activity is the game Finish First. Partners share a game board where each side has 12 spaces (1-12). Each partner should have game pieces to cover up their numbers and one set of dice for the game. Partners take turns rolling the dice. They can either add, subtract, multiply, or divide to get an answer to cover up. The first time we did this, we just used addition and subtraction. The object is to cover up every number on your game board. If you rolled a  5 and a 4, you could add for a sum of 9, or you could subtract for a different of 1. They can only cover up one number though. The strategy here is to realize which numbers are harder to cover up (1's, 2's, 11, 12) since there aren't as many ways to make those numbers with the dice. The kids love this game! Here are some fun photos from the game!





We've also been doing lots of fun science experiments! One of my favorites is Boat Afloat. I allow each student to make a boat out of tin foil. I tell them that the object is for their boat to hold the most number of pennies without sinking. They had so much fun building and testing their boats! And of course, we recorded all of our data in our Science Notebooks! Here are some of our boats!






I believe the rectangle boat held the most pennies.

The kids had a great time constructing their boats and testing them! I had a lot of fun watching them! I'll post more later!

13 comments:

  1. Awesome! I love the hands on!!! Thanks for sharing! Looks like your class has been having LOTS of fun while learning.

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  2. i love the math games!!
    GREAT!! thanks for sharing.

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  3. i LOVE your ideas- what grade do you teach?

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  4. Marshmallows make anything more fun!

    I love the tin foil boats.

    I'm waiting for you to post fun LA ideas. =)

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  5. Joan, I'll try to post more Language Arts stuff this coming week! Thanks for the feedback.

    Thanks Coffeyhouse, I teach 3rd grade.

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  6. Love the math games! I am so trying out the Science Notebooks this year with my kiddos...we'll see how that goes. :)

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  7. I love the marshmellow place value idea. You might also want to purchase the CD Rockin the Standards Math which has a place value rap on it (you can listen to it on YouTube first to hear it). My fourth graders LOVED it and had it memorized. All the songs are great on that CD (you can download individual songs from Amazon or iTunes too).

    Eve (www.sciencenotebooking.blogspot.com)

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  8. where do you get your ideas for your math games?

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  9. Alot of the ideas for the Math games come from professional developments we've had. We have a wonderful district Math person who showed us a lot of games and our school purchases the Box Cars and One Eyed Jacks game kits after we were trained. We also have a ton of great teachers at our school who make up a lot of the games. I'll be happy to share more if you want to email me. (glauren4556@gmail.com)

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  10. You are amazing! I love all the ideas!

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  11. Aw, thanks Abby! I'll keep posting more good stuff!

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  12. Yay for hands-on! I bet the kids LOVE it!

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  13. I really liked the idea of the science tin foil boats and the science journals! Science is always put on the back burner and this is a great way to keep it alive. Can't wait for more ideas!

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