Prime and Composite Numbers Smartboard activity

I adapted "Be a Prime Number Hunter" game from Education.com for the Smartboard, and my students really loved it. I think they just loved being able to use the Smartboard in a small group on their own, but it was a nice alternative to a traditional math station. Feel free to use the "game" if you are teaching prime and composite numbers. It was GREAT to hear the students debating about why certain numbers are or are not prime!


Prime Number Game

I Got the Liebster Award!

 

 

Thank you to Tales from a 4th Grade Teacher for recognizing my blog with this award!!! 

 

The goal of the award is to spotlight up-and-coming blogs with less than 200 followers. The rules are:

1. copy and paste the award on your blog
2. thank the giver and link back to them
3. reveal your top 5 picks and let them know by leaving a comment on their blog
4. hope that your followers will spread the love to other bloggers

Here are the 5 blogs that I chose to honor with this award as well:

Shepherd's Shining Stars 

A Time to Share and Create

The {Polka} Dotted Desk

The Teacher Organizer

Tales of This 4th Grade Teacher

Please check out these great teacher blogs for wonderful insights and ideas!!!

Math Stations

So, this year, I have been spending a great deal of time trying to "perfect" a math workshop approach to teaching my 4th graders. Sadly, I am finding that they seem to need a lot more direct instruction than I expected, so that is taking some of the "oomph" out of our Math Stations time during each day. I found some great ideas on TpT (links below) that I have used in my classroom. I am currently using the acronym M.A.T.H. to organize my groups. This includes:
M-Math Facts: Students can choose from a variety of math fact games such as Multiplication War, Multiplication and/or Division Bingo, Math Fact Memory, flash cards, etc.

A-At Your Seat: This is usually my time for small group, but for some groups, they have enrichment activities or independent work.

T-Technology: Our school has V-Math, so that is usually what students are tasked with working on. Sometimes I will assign online activities that correspond to our text, enVisionMATH. 

H-Hands-On: This is one area that I struggle with finding great activities for my 4th graders. We will often use the centers that came with our text series, but those are not truly "hands-on". I have done the typical things like having students solve problems using manipulatives, etc., but I feel like this is one section of our Math Stations that I need to revamp. Feel free to share any ideas you might have :)

Overall, I feel like the Math Stations approach is working, but I need to work on management a little better. I believe that my students who are generally proficient in math area doing well, while my students who struggle sometimes end up "playing" without really knowing what they are practicing. This is a work in progress, I guess. I'd love to hear any thoughts and suggestions you might have!

Teachers Pay Teachers Math Workshop "Stuff":
From Ashleigh: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/First-Days-of-Math-Workshop

From Littlest Learners: http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/MATH-WORKSHOP-ROTATION-BOARD

Wow...Thanksgiving is over already?!?!

Where is this school year going? I cannot believe that Thanksgiving has come and gone, and now we have 3 crazy weeks until our winter break!

I really wanted to have an awesome teacher blog this year, but I guess that will have to wait until my 2 graduate courses are over in mid-December. I apologize for not having FUN and FRESH stuff to share! However, with that being said, because I started this blog, I have learned so much and found so many wonderful ideas from my fellow teacher bloggers! You all are the BEST!!!

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and that the upcoming holidays allow you to get some rest and relaxation!! I promise to spend some time updating my blog very soon!

TBA Book Club--The End Of Molasses Classes by Ron Clark

I am participating in a book club linky party. We are discussing The End of Molasses Classes by Ron Clark. Ok, I am posting on my iPhone, so I will keep this brief tonight. I will add more tomorrow. I just completed Principle 5: Listen. While the whole book has affected me and moved me and motivated me, the section about listening to our students really hit home. Sometimes I think we fail to stop and listen, or we fail to ask the right questions when we have troubled students. Maybe they are just waiting for us to talk to them, to help them. I feel like maybe I have had some "Kenneths" over the years, and I do not want to let any more to slip by without me reaching out to them. I am going to work on my listening skills and try to remember that sometimes, we have to take a risk and ask our students what is going on.

I'm BACK!

I am so horrible at keeping up with this blog! I apologize!  However, I do think my absence can be excused because here is a list of what I have been up to:

1. I am a member of our school's Continuous School Improvement Committee. We are building everything from scratch since we are a brand new school. It is interesting to say the least!
2. I am taking a course on designing computer-based instruction. It is a GREAT learning experience that is adding to what I learned during my studies in my MAEd in Instructional Technology program.
3. I am taking a course on Gaggle through my school system.
4. I went to the N.C. Elementary Educators conference last weekend. I got to see Ron Clark speak, and he is definitely a motivator! I went back into my classroom with a new outlook on how I want to teach my students. This was the second time I had the opportunity to hear him speak, and I think this time around it meant a lot more to me. The first time, I was a brand-new teacher and probably had no clue about the challenges I would face and how to handle them :)

Am I forgiven?? :)


I also saw "The Bag Ladies" at the conference. Oh my gosh, they have some of the greatest project ideas! I am trying to figure out where I want to use some of their ideas. I wish their website had some "freebie" ideas (I think that might encourage people to buy the books if they haven't seen them in person). They offered up some great ideas to make activities that we do in the classroom into FUN, hands-on activities. I know my students love to do "artsy" things, and these are easy enough for a crafty-challenged person like me to do and to teach! Check them out! The Bag Ladies

I created a tutorial for the Three Branches of the U.S. Government that I will share with you once I tweak it a bit. I only got an 88% :( so I need to fix some things before I make it public!

The First 3 Weeks

Oh wow, it has been a whirlwind the past 3 weeks! We finally got into our building on August 30th, and I feel like I have not stopped running since then. Our school is BEAUTIFUL! It has some flaws....closest adult restroom is in the office, classroom design not the best to allow easy flow of students, not a lot of space for a classroom full of 9-10 year olds, lack of furniture to allow for group work, etc. It is very obvious that teachers were not asked to serve as consultants to the architect. However, overall, it is a wonderful space and we will learn to make it all work for us as the years go by. Our Smartboards are expected to be installed this week. I am doing a HUGE happy dance for that. It has been tough living without any sort of projection technology for the first 3 weeks. We got 10 boxes of math manipulatives last week, so now I feel like I can be a proper math teacher. It is all falling into place! The students are happy, (most of) the teachers are happy, parents are happy. It will be a great year!

I am attempting to do "Math Workshop" in my class this year. I found some great ideas from a variety of teachers including these two things from TeachersPayTeachers.com:

Math Workshop Rotation Board
First Days of Math Workshop

I know I have not been providing many "fantastically fresh and fun" 4th grade ideas so far, but I will share things soon!!! Until then, thank you for following my blog!

Oh, and here are some pics of my classroom. We have not been given the go-ahead to put things on walls, so it is a bit bare. I have actually changed it up a bit since these pictures were taken.