Makeover Madness: Week one TPT Challenge

Hi there! Happy weekend. I am excited

to be a part of the TPT Seller Challenge

hosted by 4 fabulous bloggers. 

See Below!

I have been absent from my TPT world lately.

Life has just gotten in the way. 

I have on my summer list to do some makeovers,

so this was the perfect way to get started.

One of my best sellers is a set of task cards

that I use at the beginning of the school year. 

I have three sets of them. One for addition with 

regrouping, one for subtraction with regrouping

and one for place value. I also have them linked together

in a bundle pack.

My goal is to revamp the whole entire bundle,

but for now I have the first set done. 

Here is what I started with----

In my defense, it wasn't a bad start.

I use them a lot with students,

especially when I'm trying to do some assessing

at the beginning of the year. 

I decided to change it up a bit and

I LOVE how it turned out. 

I would love for you to check it out!

Click Here!

It's going to be FREE for a flash and then 

discounted. I'd love some feedback too!

I'm super excited to get on the next product

for this bundle. :)

#MyMathJourney Part 2- Spark Student Motivation

Happy Weekend!!!

I am just loving the Fall weather that we've been having!

How is the weather by you? 

I'm excited today to share part 2 of #MyMathJourney 

with you today. 

Part 1 wasn't huge, but it was the start of everything. 

Here it is, if you would like some background. 

I'm linking up with Head Over Heels for Teaching

for Spark Student Motivation. 

Here's how I'm doing it in math!!!

 First of all I want to give credit where credit is due. I've been following these bloggers closely and have gotten some great ideas from them to help me get started on my journey!!!  Without this blogging world I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing... So, THANK YOU!

I've also done some purchasing from TpT. 

This was a great one to get me started!

I've decided to start small, but It's been going great! 

Here's a look at our 4 centers. 

Most days we do all of them, 

but it all depends on how many activities 

we need to get accomplished from our teaching resource. 

Our school is in the second year of Math Expressions. 

Some days are a lot more difficult than others,

but I have found that doing math stations helps

to break apart the different lessons that I need to teach. 

I start my math block at 8:45 and we all start together.
Typically my mini-lesson goes unit 9:10 or so. 

There are a lot of aspects of the mini-lesson 

so it takes longer than maybe it should sometimes.  

We do a lot of math talk, 

so that is usually what takes longer. 

From 9:10-9:25 we do our first rotation. 

From 9:25-9:40 we do our second rotation. 

Rotations are:

1. Small Group- With me at the back table.  I have set up groups so that everyone does this EVERY day with me. Even when our RtI starts and kids are pulled out for intervention, they will never miss small group time with me.  The would only miss a choice rotation like computers or daily centers. Here is a sampling of our distributive property lessons in small group. 

2. Independent Word Center- This is where they work on something on their own about the topic that I've taught for the day. Typically they do this right after the small group center, except for my challenge group.  Those kiddos start the independent center right after the mini-lesson.  I like this a lot because even if they have trouble with it, the activity really gets them thinking and working together to challenge their brains. When they come to work with me, we start by going over their independent center and talk about their thought process. 

Here are two kiddos working on an assignment after they work with me at the back table. This reinforces what I teach and gives them time to explore with the topic being taught. 

3. Computer- We just went 1:1 on chrome books, so I'm trying to incorporate a technology component each week in rotations.  Right now we're just using some websites that can help us with our basic facts.  A favorite right now is 

digitwhiz. Next week I will share a new site shared with me by a teammate. 

  

4. Centers- There is a new center for each day of the week. I mix them up. This is more for review and spiraling of materials. One day is a review center from an old topic, two days are activities that work on current skills we are covering, one day is a math journal so we write about our current topics and one day is a fact practice activity. 

Centers are laid out in boxes for the week.  Don't be fooled, they mostly look like worksheets, but they aren't the typical ones.  The sheet usually give directions to them to use hands on manipulatives to answer problems. There is not always something to hand in. 

I've been making season task cards to practice skills like addition with regrouping, subtraction with regrouping and place value. These are three concepts that they need to keep in their minds as we move on with multiplication.  So far they are really loving them.  Check them out from my TpT Store! You can buy just one or the whole bundle at a discount.

Here is a set from my Back To School Pack

Here are my fall centers. 

We then come back together and discuss
or do another mini-lesson from 9:40-10ish. 

This one is dependent on how much is in the lesson
 and what kids are having questions on. 

From 1:15-1:30 we have our third rotation

From 1:30-1:45 we have our fourth rotation

It's a split block, which is hard,

 but our intervention time is in the afternoon from 1:15-1:45.

 I like to run my classroom in small groups,
especially during RtI time

 so that kids don't feel like they are missing things 

if they are pulled from class. 

Also so I can get more time with students 

who need extra help or a challenge!

Since it's not in my math core time, 

those students who get pulled 

will not miss any new core materials 

or small group time with me. 

I'm only 2 weeks in.  

They light up when it's time to do rotations. 

On the days that we aren't able to they are begging to do them!

 When my mom came to visit the other day, 

many of them shared their favorite things with her. 

Most kids shared more than one, 

but for the first time I had the majority of kids

 talking about their math rotations being their favorite. 

I'm gong to share more later! 

If you have any ideas or suggestions, please let me know!

I hope you all have a great weekend. 

#MyMathJourney

Oh Sunday....

How I both love and hate you.

I don't know about you

but lately I feel like my weekends

are so packed, that Sunday becomes

a mad dash to get everything done that needs to get done. 

I'm linking up with Jennifer from Mrs. Laffin's Laughings

for A Peek at my Week! :)

I'm trying to stay on top of things for this next week----

and that starts with #MyMathJourney

Recently my district has adopted Math Expressions. 

I'm in year 2 right now. 

The process for me is slow. 

It has taken some time for me to get used to teaching differently---

but I've seen great progress with kids so I'm excited!

There's so much to get in and teach

 that the majority of my math block has been whole group instruction. (ICK)

This year I have a very large divide in math skills

that my students possess

 as we start learning the concept of multiplication, 

and whole group all of the time....

well....

it just isn't working. 

So after so much blog stalking....

(here are two that I keep going back to for help)

and TpT purchases....

I'm gong to try to run things just a bit different this next week. 

Math Plans-  I plan to run both whole group and small group instruction this next week in math. I will utilize our math intervention time to work with small groups of students that needs some extra help. While I do that I also have on-level and enrichment activities to both practice the current skill that we're learning in class and also topics that we've already done to spiral them back.  It's a very large work in progress but here's a small overview and what I hope will happen.  

Mini-Lesson: We will discuss the topic of the day for each day at the beginning of the math block. After that, I will send my higher level students off to do some independent work on the topic just taught, and I will then work with small groups of students who will need more instruction.  When its time to rotate I will send my small group to do some independent work and continue.  Students who aren't working with me will work on the following: 

1. Independent Work (work that covers our topic being taught right now)

2. Fact Practice- This will consist of a computer website this week, but will change as the weeks go on to practice facts in different ways.  This week we will do digit whiz. If you haven't used it yet, I recommend that you check it out. Kids LOVE it! And, it's free, so what could be better?

3. Centers- This is an activity that students will work on if they finish up their independent work early. They will be different each day. Some days will be extra work on our current skill, other days it may be a math journal or a skill that we are spiraling.  Activities include partner work, games, or writing. 

4. Small Group- This will be with me for additional teaching and practice. I will also then cycle around the room as students work on independent work to check in. 

The end of the math block will end with a closing/ mini-lesson as well so we can do a small formative assessment. This way I can see where we are from today and decide what we will move forward with as the next day approaches. 

Due to the length of this post already, I'm just going to leave math at that. Next week I'll share more in-depth on how it will look as I have a week under my belt and can talk more about the actual teaching going on and the concepts being taught!  

Reading- Small groups are starting this week as my students are all trained in Daily 5 and area ready to go. I'll be working with small groups on story elements (a review) and comparing and contrasting. We will be using the story: The Three Little Pigs to help us do that. Based off of book levels, different groups will get different stories.  We will be making Venn-diagrams to compare stories as the week goes on and then sharing the different versions that we read with each other.  Some of the books that I will be using are: (click each picture to go to amazon)

I have more... much more.. but I'll stop there. This is getting long. If you stuck with me, thanks!!! Hope everyone has a great week!