Fun With Firsties: assessment

Showing posts with label assessment. Show all posts

Monday, April 13, 2015

Our Probability Unit: worksheets, activities, lessons, and assessment

Hi all! If you follow me on Instagram then you probably saw what I posted this morning:

So needless to say I won't be in the classroom today and, according to the doctor (but not me yet!), for the rest of the week. But I will still share what my firsties will be up to anyways :)

Last week I introduced a new math unit on probability. We began by discussing some new math words that we will be using frequently throughout this short little unit: likely, unlikely, certain, and impossible.

Before school one day, I printed and cut out a whole bunch of simple scenarios. At the beginning of each lesson over the next few days we discussed and sorted the scenarios according to their likelihood:

The "impossible" scenarios were by far the biggest hit with my firsties :P

To practice our understanding of these 4 new math words, we created our own probability flip books that featured events that were likely to occur, unlikely, certain, and impossible:

This flip book is part of my Probability Pack

To make these books all I did was print off the first page for each student and staple it with 3 other blank pages (you can use as many or as little blank pages as you'd like depending on how many scenarios you want your kiddies to come up with). Then the students cut along the 3 dotted lined to make their flip books.

Today, the kids are going to learn about spinners. I created a SMARTboard file for the supply teacher to use while introducing this concept. It simply features a spinner with 3 different-sized sections (similar to the one on the paper below) with several questions to discuss about likelihood. The kids then get to make their own spinners!

This activity is also part of my Probability Pack

The kids will: 1. Decorate each spinner section 2. Create a spinner using a paperclip and brad 3. choose three sections of their spinner and copy the pattern into each of the three blank boxes 4. Answer the questions 5. Spin their spinner 10 times and record the results on a graph (second page not pictured)

Although I won't be there, the kids will continue learning about probability throughout the week and will work through the rest of the practice pages in my Probability Pack. Here's an overview of what else they will be doing (and exactly what else is included in the pack if you're interested!):

I also have a random FREEBIE for you!👇

And even if you're not into sweet little Color Monster (😆) I'd love for you to join anyways because saving you time and sending you occasional (FREE) teacher treats is my favourite!!

And before I go make some hot water with lemon and honey, I'd like to congratulate Jena who was the winner of my Student Awards giveaway! Congrats Jena :)

Saturday, February 28, 2015

Math, Writing, & P/T Interview FREEBIES!

Phew! This pregnant person is popped! We had another busy week that seemed to just fly by.

All the schools in our area headed to the arena for school vs. school skating races.

The kids raced by age group and then there was a hockey game in the afternoon. It was so fun watching some of my firsties participate in the races!

I won't lie, the wipeouts were my favourite part...what a terrible teacher!

And those who didn't race, happily cheered our school on:

It was fun, but definitely *way* too much chaos for this Type A teacher. I was so happy to get back to our classroom!!

So anyways, amid the rush of the week, I didn't get around to documenting our activities much. The good news is, that means this post will just feature some random FREEBIES for y'all!

Let's start with writing! We have been working on opinion writing and I created this graphic organizer to help my firsties organize their ideas:

We originally started out just writing our opinion pieces on standard lined paper (following the same structure: a statement of their opinion and three reasons for their opinion) but I have found this organizer to be SO helpful to my firsties. Their writing is so much clearer and has actually improved quite drastically as a result.

If you read last week's post, you already know that we have been working on balancing equations. We finished up this unit with some more simple skip counting & balancing equations math centres:

*Click HERE to download the above activity as well as the activity featured in THIS POST*

The kids loved making their own little cut & paste skip counting books. Once they were done, I stapled them on the indicated staple lines (as seen on the left side of the booklet) and then they coloured their book if they had extra time.

One of the other math centres was a balancing equations partner activity, where my firsties worked in pairs to complete a booklet:

Title Page:

Interior Pages:

*Click HERE or either pic above to download!*

Each partner got their own booklet with one title page and 4 interior pages. They completed one side of each pan balance on their own by either writing a number, addition sentence or subtraction sentence, or by drawing any number of objects. Once half of each page was filled out, they switched booklets with their partner and their partner had to complete each page by balancing the pan balance in a different way (e.g. If one partner wrote the number "4" on the left side, then the other partner might draw 4 stars on the right side).

Last but not least, Term 1 report cards went home last week which meant Parent/Teacher interviews this week! I tried something new and created this printout to help guide each interview:

*Click HERE to download this FREEBIE!*

I found it much more helpful (and efficient) to write my thoughts on this page as opposed to a little sticky note. Plus it was nice to be able to provide a copy for each parent to take home at the end of the conference.

I hope you find some (or all!) of those freebies useful! Have a wonderful weekend :)

Saturday, February 21, 2015

Balancing Equations

I don't know about you, but my four-day week FLEW by! Between Shrove Tuesday, Flag Day (this year marks the 50th anniversary of our Canadian Flag!), & Ash Wednesday mass, I feel like we barely had time to get anything accomplished this week. Except for in math...

My firsties absolutely knocked.my.socks.off. with how well they grasped balancing equations in such a short time. In the past I have found that this is a *very* challenging concept for most kids to catch on to but this bunch had it going on! I first introduced the concept with this very simple SMARTboard activity:

I made a blank pan balance template with 4 shape choices for us to manipulate. I started off very simple with just pictures and numbers (such as the example pictured above; a number of objects on one side, and a numeral on the other). Because they picked this up so quickly, I moved on to include addition sentences, subtraction sentences, and other combinations for them to come up and balance in any way (i.e. using pictures, numbers or equations).

We used this same file in so many ways all throughout the week: from the students balancing an example that I had provided, to them identifying whether or not my scale was balanced, to figuring out what we needed to change in order to make it balanced.

(FYI: The shapes are infinitely cloned so all you have to do is tap and drag the shape you want to either side of the pan balance. To delete a shape off the pan balance simply select & delete. The 4 shapes will always remain at the bottom.)

Click HERE or the picture above to download the SMARTboard file (for FREE!)

By the end of the week, my firsties were such pros that we played a little "game" where I invited pairs of students to come up and make up their own balanced equations. One student would would begin by either placing objects, writing an addition or subtraction equation, or writing a numeral on one side of the pan balance. Then the other student would decide how to balance the equation on the other side. The rest of us had to give thumbs up or thumbs down to determine whether or not the scale was balanced. It's amazing how much fun they have when they get to use the SMARTboard...it never gets old!

To practice our new skill independently, I put together this little Balancing Equations pack that approaches the concept from a variety of angles. I also ended up using one of the pages as a final assessment piece:

This pack is available in my little store.

I know many of my friends south of the border had a short week as well but for different reasons. I hope you're all keeping warm...just keep thinking: only 27 more days until SPRING!