Maths PD with Linda about CoL

Monday afternoon meeting with Linda and the middle school

Warm up game

• Warm up games - roll 2 dice. Multiply and get answer, add and get answer, then work out the difference: 3 x 4 = 12, 3 + 4 = 7 so 12 minus 7 = 5. You move five up on the 100's board.
• Salute - 3 chn play. 2 put cards on their heads, 1 calls out the sum of the 2 cards. Students with cards on their heads have to guess what card they must have.
• Addition wars/subtractions wars/multiplication wars
• Subitising patterns etc. 3 tens frames and one with 4 on it. 
• Around the world - just give them the answer and they have to do the equation
• Noggle - number boggle

Probability ideas

• Counters in a bag with 3 red, 4 blue, 1 green, no yellow. What are the chances that I pull out ......
• SKUNK - write on the board
• Toy Theater probability 
• Heads and Tails game - True or false
• Heads and tails combinations with number tree
• Show brainpop jr video of combinations
• Roll the dice with a buddy - 20 times - what number comes up the most - should be 7?? Tie it into stats - up to 12. Then compare with another group.
• Check in with AWS books - statistics 

Maths PD with Linda and learnings from CoL

• Lots of discussion about data collected and making sure we have the right information on Linc Ed.
• Linda talked to us about the equals sign, and making sure chn understand that it means 'the same as'. Gave us examples on how to use in class and what to teach. 
• 8 = 8. True or false. 
• Went into introduction to algebra.
•  __ = 21 + 5.
• Have been having awesome conversations with my class about the fluidity of numbers and great class discussions. 
• The above examples have been great for warm ups and extending learning of what math symbols actually mean. 

Professional Converstaions: Tutor teacher meeting with Kate

Topics discussed today:

Calendar art

• It's a fundraiser
• Having the child's picture on makes an impression
• Pinterest and other teachers for ideas

Maths appraisal 

• Discussion around doing Fraction Friday or continuing with same programme.
• What does Senior Teacher want to see?
• Conversation flowed on to maths discussion in general, with sharing ideas from each others classes. Kate has been doing awesome directions and maps with her class including blindfolded obstacles course. For end of term my class will make a paper mache island following on from Dragon Brothers novel being read in class. Will use grids and scales to make and design mystery island.

Parents 

• How best to deal with one parent who insists on texting and being emotionally manipulative.
• Taken conversation back to email, as opposed to texting, and setting firm boundaries with communication. Kate talked with Jenna too. 

Election boxes

• Cool discussion about how best to teach and discuss NZ's election. Talked about having the 4 major parties and what they stand for - Greens environment, Red - social amenities, Blue - money and finances and exports etc, Black - culture and heritage. Have chn bus stop ideas on what those parties policies would be. Doing lessons from the box. Voting at the end of the week.

The beauty of the cardboard arcade

Once a year at the end of term I like to show my class the Youtube clip Caine's Arcade. It shows a 9 year old boy who's arcade went viral after being discovered by a videographer in the States. Caine's creativity and positivity is inspiring, and it feels like some good old fashioned 80's childhood inventing. For the second year in a row my class have absolutely loved the creating, and then the hosting of other classes when they came in to play the games. Two other classes were also inspired to make their own arcade games following the success of ours.

I believe it develops:

• Creativity where children only have cardboard and sellotape to make any type of game they can imagine.
• Collaboration and compromising skills as many of them worked in teams.
• Problem solving and innovation - what to do when something doesn't work they way they imagined

A cure for boredom at home in the holidays!

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Book Battle Quiz 2017

Keeping within the promotion of the library and reading I was able to take 2 teams of 4 to the West Auckland Book Battle held at Hobsonville Point Secondary School. 

I had amazing support from four parents who were able to come and support their children (and more importantly provide transport!)

I was so impressed with the students' general knowledge of books and literature. 

The students had a lot of fun participating in this event.

Team B placed 2nd! They won a box of books for the school library and a Westfield voucher for themselves. 

These students came back to school totally buzzing from the experience, and were proud to stand at Whanau Time to share about it later on in the week. 

Community Engagement Through Poetry

My class spent a lot of time perfecting their haiku poems. The focus was Word Choice, which was especially imperative with the limited syllable count in the haiku structure. 

We published them on a Poem in my Pocket template, and presented them to members of our community at the local shops.

It was awesome to see my class wanting to engage with members of the community, and being brave talking to new people. 

They read their poems to people before letting them keep their original poems. 

It was a pretty delightful experience for us all. Lovely to see all the smiles from both my students and adults. 

Math/Fraction PD

Fractions with Linda and with Bryony from Waitakere College

Discussed common misconceptions in students understanding of fractions and how to teach.

Eg. 2/5 + 4/5 = 6/10

1/2 = 0.2

1/4 is bigger than 1/2. 

Bryony reminds us that teaching that fractions are equal parts is so important for students to understand from the very beginning.

Idea:
Fold a piece of paper in half. Cut out a border from a blank piece of paper. Cut strips from the middle bit. Use to show and visualise halves, quarters etc. Can put equipment in the sets so they can see 3/4 of a set of 12 etc.

For teaching and introducing decimals go to NZ Maths and download the decimats.
NZ Maths Decimats

Bryony introduced the double number line for teaching ratios. Possibly stay away from the 1:2 ratio as students just think it's half.

Looked at Mixing Colours - Pink Book Number 7, Pg 50. Ratio's and colours.