Math Museums

So, I am very new to Everyday Math, but one recommended 1st grade activity is creating various "math museums" to display objects related to the topic we are focusing on. A few weeks ago, I had my students bring in 5 items from home that showed numbers. We then classified their "number" objects into things we find/use at home, at school, and in the community. We also discussed the various ways numbers are used in our daily lives (money, measurement, addresses, phone numbers, street signs, etc.). It was a great way to make the math that we study each day relevant. For many days after we "opened" our museum, students were bringing in new examples or pointing out numbers in textbooks, the cafeteria, and all around the school. My next museum will be a "Patterns Museum" since we are focusing on patterns right now. I am excited to see what the students bring in to share!

Do any of you use Everyday Math? What are your favorite activities?



Here are some pictures of our "museum":

Moving on down....to 1st Grade

Well, I suppose I need to change the title of my blog because as of this past Thursday, I am now a 1st grade teacher! On August 2nd, my family arrived in Okinawa, Japan. Less than a week later, I got a few calls for interviews at Department of Defense schools (I taught in the same system in the US). I interviewed at two schools, both for 1st grade, and received job offers from both! I accepted a position at my children's school and it has been a whirlwind ever since.

I got to meet my wonderful students and their parents on Friday. It was so hard for me because my classroom was NOT at all ready, but the parents were so gracious and understanding. Our household goods did not arrive on the island until Thursday (2 months after they were packed and shipped from our home in NC), and I had given away quite a bit of my teaching gear because I was worried I wouldn't get a job and I would not have the room in our home to store it. Boy am I kicking myself now :) I did save a lot of books and other materials, so I will just have to deal with what I have for now. Fortunately, my school has great materials in the classroom ready to go.

aI spent today organizing my home and working on plans for the first week of school. We start on Monday! Tomorrow I will be heading in to finish up my classroom the best I can for the start of the year. I have a feeling it will be an ongoing process, but I am so excited! I am praying for quick shipping since we don't have teacher stores or anything here. EEK! I hope you will continue to visit my blog, as I will continue to share ideas and activities, but now they will focus a bit more on primary concepts!

I hope everyone has a WONDERFUL school year!!
-Colleen

Feeling Lost this Summer!

This is the first summer in quite some time that I haven't had any planning to do, and I am not sure that I like it! Since we are moving to Japan, I do not have a teaching job lined up. It doesn't sound very promising that I will get one anytime soon :( So, I have been browsing Pinterest and all of the teaching blogs to try to gather awesome ideas for all of the grade levels in case I have the opportunity to teach. What are some of your favorite blogs for "general" education ideas?

Summertime!!!

The end of the year festivities this year were bittersweet as I said goodbye to my students and my school. My family is moving to Okinawa, Japan this summer. I had to give away TONS of my teaching materials, and that was SOOOOOO rough! Fortunately, I know that my colleagues will get so much use out of them. I still have about 6 bins of things, so I won't be heading overseas empty-handed. I am not sure if I will be able to get a teaching job for next year, but who knows.

Here are pictures of the gifts I did for my students:

I just found some cute, FREE water bottle labels, threw in some smarties, drink mix, and a crazy straw. They all seemed excited!

I had my students do an activity I found on the blog "Confessions of a Teaching Junkie" called "Just One Word", then created word clouds using on Tagxedo.

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End of the Year

Wow, this school year has definitely flown by! My grade level has decided to do a "Minute to Win It" game day to celebrate the last days of school. I am so thankful for all of the wonderful teacher blogs out there who have shared information about how they did activities like this in their classrooms. We are also doing some heavy-duty review, especially in Math. I am sad to see how much my students have forgotten, even with regular review throughout the year :(

What are some of the end-of-year activities you do with your class??

Our Weather Instruments

 Thermometer

 Barometer

 Wind Vane 

 Anemometer 

Hygrometer

Classification Activity

At the beginning of our Living Organisms unit, we study Animal Classification. The students do very well with this unit (I have not met many 4th graders who don't love some sort of animals!!), but I like them to have a greater understanding of the process of classification. It also helps them to understand why some crazy creatures, like the platypus, are in certain groups even though they have characteristics of others. This year, we used a variety of beans and left it open to the students to determine how to classify each type of bean. The students had a blast, and it was great to hear them defending their classification groups!