Daily Archives: September 16, 2016

Digital Recording: Counting Strategies

I shared the story of how we have been counting EVERYTHING in our room this week, but there’s a quick story that actually come just before that, as we started our initial journey into practicing counting and recording our strategies.

Kiddos were given a partner and a “mystery bag,” which was full of between 10-35 of something (bags were differentiated for different counters), and asked to figure out how many things were in it.  They were to use an efficient strategy and somehow capture an image to demonstrate how they counted their item(s).  Partners worked together to determine the most efficient way to count their items, took pictures together, talked about their work and added explanations to their pictures via the Notability app on their iPads.

Through the information I received from seeing their images, as well as through observations and conversations conducted during their work time, I was able to more effectively create pairings for later in the investigation.  Partnerships were formed to best challenge and support mathematicians in their continued learning.

Mathematical strategies and digital tools for the win!

 

Read With Your Roadrunner!

At Robinson we have a great tradition called Read With Your Roadrunner, where kiddos get to start their day reading with special people in their lives.  Today was the first RWYR for this year. 🙂

We had lots of fun with our visitors today and we’re SO GLAD they came to start the day with us!

#classroombookaday UPDATE: Week 4

I cannot believe how much fun we’re having with #classroombookaday, nor how many books we’ve already read!  For all I know, we usually read this many books in 1st grade together (I’ve never officially kept track), but regardless it’s SO GREAT to watch the pictures get added and begin to fill up the door!

This week I think we added almost 20 books and I’m not sure we can pick a favorite!

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I do have to give a huge shoutout to Keira’s mom (loyal blog reader!) who left us some GREAT suggestions when she was at school for Read With Your Roadrunner today that she thought we would love.  And BOY was she right! I had never seen Red: A Crayon’s Story or Clancy the Courageous Cow before today but they will definitely be added to my classroom collection!  Both fit in perfectly (like she said they would!) with our conversations about valuing everyone for their uniqueness and celebrating how everyone can do something really well (even if that thing ends up being a surprise!).  Thanks for the suggestions!  Feel free to share your books with us anytime you want!  (That request goes for anyone, by the way!) 🙂

Gotta Count ‘Em All!

We’ve been working on a beginning counting and place value unit in math lately, and the premise behind the investigation is that we need to organize and do inventory on things in our classroom (this came after we read a story about a messy family called the Masloppys and how their son Nicholas does just that in their house so they can find things!).  We’ve been counting everything in our room. And I do mean everything.  If it’s not attached to the floor (or too heavy to pick up), someone has put their mathematician fingers on it!

Kiddos worked in pairs to catalog a collection of classroom items (and then many more as they finished), focusing on using efficient and accurate ways to count the group.  Students were charged to find a way to easily share their thinking with others; counting by groups or keeping track made it easier to tell someone else what they had done.   Callahan and Jesse were especially proud to share the learning they had brought with them from kindergarten (“Mr. Peacock taught us to make groups of 10!”), and they made bunches of 10 crayons into a bundle of 100!

We have had many conversations sharing kid strategies, tips and suggestions for how to count large groups of things, and then we started to look at the numbers of totals.  We wanted to know how many bundles of 10 we would have in each amount (if we counted like Callahan and Jesse!).  Our chart began together with some class numbers, and then kiddos got in on the fun (work!) as they continued to count EVERYTHING in our room:

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(As a side note, I am always excited with how many possibilities there are for ELA in math–here for example as I could conference with kiddos as they wrote on the chart and helped them work through sounds in words!)

It was funny as kiddos kept running up to me asking “Can I count this?”  The more they counted, too, the smarter they got at using efficient groups–notice all the rubber bands, cups and baggies in our pictures?

We counted so many things we needed to record that Rachel asked for a new sheet.  Love it!

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The next phase is moving into further connections with 10s, as we think about how many we’d have to had to have whole groups of 10 for each item.  We’re playing math games to make combinations of 10 in a variety of ways , and will continue this thinking as we move into addition and subtraction.  Place value discussions throughout the year will go back to these beginning inventory experiences. 🙂