We love Reviewing Math Skills!

Posted on May 21, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

This week we decided that each day after our math lesson, we wanted to have a lot of new math centers that review the concepts we’ve learned this year! The Busy Class and K-5 Math Teaching Resources came to rescue Mrs. Felter and give her some great ideas! We set up new expectations for our math center time. Here are the rules we established:

Expectations for Math Centers

Have a positive attitude about centers and partners.
Read the directions before asking for help!
Stay focused the whole time.
Organize your materials and clean up when you’re done.
All done? Clean up & find Mrs. F for a new center!

With these new expectations, that we created ourselves, we are having a fabulous time! Here we are hard at work.

Math in Action!

Posted on May 3, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

We took our whole class math block to a whole new level this week! We played “Agree, Argue, Aspire”, worked in teams and independently, took our fraction knowledge deeper, and capped it all off with multiplication Jeopardy! Our class was focused and engaged all week long, and you have made me so proud!

We studied Karmyn’s work on her practice EOG test. Check out how she tried three different strategies before getting an answer with which she was confident! Karmyn’s work showed us that she can truly persevere when things get tough. Her example gave us a lot to aspire to!

Don’t be afraid to try more than one strategy!

Never be afraid to start all over!

Here we are studying Karmyn’s work and deciding what we agreed with, what we wanted to argue with, and what we could aspire to do in our own work!

If you’d like to try out multiplication Jeopardy at home click on the picture below. Get your family involved! See if you can beat your siblings and parents! Remember your good sportsmanship. Even though the girls were our big winner our boys acted like true gentlemen!

The 3 A’s Game!

Posted on April 29, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

Today we played a new game to help us think deeper about our math strategies. We worked on our 3 A’s:

Agree!
Argue!
Aspire!

To play this game we looked at a math problem that had already been solved. We picked one thing that we agreed with. For example, “Oh, this student used the correct numbers.” or “I can see that they chose the right operation because this is a multiplication problem!”

Next, we had to find something to argue with like, “I would have drawn out based ten blocks instead of using the algorithm,” or “They chose the correct numbers but the wrong operation, they should have divided.”

Finally, we chose something that student did that we could aspire to! For example, “I like how they drew pictures to visualize their math,” or “I like how they wrote their answer out in words so that they could check if they really answered what the questions was asking.”

We are going to continue using the 3 A’s strategy to learn from our peers and aspire to their greatness!

Number line or Fraction Model

Posted on April 24, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

$number line or fraction model$ We have been looking at different methods of representing fractions so that we can picture them in our minds. Two strategies we have tried are, representing fractions on a number line and drawing out fraction models . Both strategies help us visualize the fractions we’re working with and make it very easy to see if two fractions are equivalent.

So, which method helps you visualize the fraction better, fractions on a number line or fraction models?

The “Fraction Cake” lesson the students are working on in the photos can be found here!

iPads & Literacy

Posted on April 21, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

Today, we focused on our improving our literacy skills by reading a fabulous article on The Original Rosie the Riveter on our iPads! This article, on Newsela.com, had some complicated vocabulary. Good readers understand that they don’t have to know every word in a story or article to understand the big picture, or main idea. When you don’t know all of the words, use the clues around the word to help you!

For example, here is an excerpt from the article: “She was trying to escape being poor. Monroe was determined to find work at the Willow Run airplane plant in Ypsilanti, Mich. She wanted to fly a plane. But with two children, she wasn’t allowed.”

I have never heard of the words “Ypsilanti, Mich” before, but using the clues around the word I can see that it is where the airplane plant was located. So, using these clues I bet that Ypsilanti, Mich is a place (ok, ok, since I’m an adult reader I can tell you that Ypsilanti, Mich is a city in Michigan, but I wanted to model how to use clues!)

Keep reading and hunting for clues to unknown words!

Rosie the Riveter Returns!

Posted on April 20, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

I noticed something interesting on my favorite nonfiction reading site for kids. Newsela.com is a great website that contains many current news articles written for students. When you click on the left of the site you can change the Lexile level of the article. A lower Lexile level will be easier to read and a higher level will be more difficult, probably on a middle school level. On Newsela I found this great article, The Original Rosie the Riveter had the Right Name for the Job! The article discusses the same Rosie we learned about in Andrea Beaty’s book, Rosie Revere Engineer! Take a few minutes to read and enjoy this article. Adjust the Lexile level on the left if the text seems too difficult or simple!

Here’s one of our favorite pages from Rosie Revere Engineer! (If you want to learn about powerful, smart women then check out this book!)

Another Snow Day!

Posted on February 12, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

Hello Antwan, Nancy, Shannallie, Karmyn, Yasmin, and Ixell!

I had a feeling you’d be visiting the blog today when you took a break from playing in the snow (please remember to where hats and mittens!) Did anyone else visit today who I didn’t list? Let me know by leaving a comment!

Here are some word problems to keep your brain working on this very cold, winter day!

1. Antwan ran 444 yards in his first game playing football for Florida State. In his next game, Antwan, threw for 156 yards. How many yards total did Antwan move the football down the field?

2. Yasmin has 6 packs of crayons and each pack has 8 crayons. The crayons in each pack are red, yellow, blue, green, orange, purple, brown, and black. If Yasmin gives Karmyn one pack of crayons, how many total crayons will Yasmin have left?

3. Shannallie, Nancy, and Ixell ran 3 miles each day last week. If next week they plan to run 5 miles each day, how many miles will they each run after both weeks?

Leave your answers in the comments and I’ll come up with more questions just for you!

Here are some of my snowy day pictures from yesterday!

Second graders make it back to class through the Tuesday snow!

Wow! Our playground is covered in snow!

Pablo enjoys his first walk in the snow!

“Hey! I caught a snowflake on my nose!” – Pablo Cinco Felter

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Pablo was very sleepy after playing in the snow!

Decomposing a Kilogram

Posted on January 13, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

On Monday, we sat down and took a kilogram apart. A kilogram is a unit that is used to measure weight. Often grocery store items are measured in kilograms. We learned that:

1 kg = 1 kilogram!

By decomposing a kilogram we discovered that:

1 kilogram = 1,000 grams or

1 kg = 1 g!

We also determined that 100 grams could go into a kilogram 10 times and 10 grams could go into 100 grams 10 times! Check out these mathematicians at work!

Thank you EngageNy.Org for the wonderful lesson idea!

Measuring Matter

Posted on January 12, 2014 by LearnCharlotte

As we continue our study of matter (the gases, liquids, and solids that are all around us) we wanted to get our hands on some matter and check it out. We picked objects in our room made of matter and observed their properties. We took notes on our object’s shape, size, flexibility, luster, texture, and weight. We were able to use our tape measures and balances to observe matter as well! Check out the hard working scientist below!

Biography Research

Posted on December 3, 2013 by LearnCharlotte

Yesterday, we researched our entrepreneurs and inventors on the internet. We found some valuable information, but internet research is never as easy as it seems. Let’s take a step back to see what we did well and where we need support.

1. What key words did you use to do your search?

2. How many websites did you visit?

3. Did you stay on websites that were too hard to read?

4. How much research were you able to do?