Math Blogs

I just read about a few math blogs that are aiming to make math more accessible, interesting, real-world, etc. One of my favorites is Bedtime Math, which gives a math task for parents to do with their kids each night. Check out my Blogs page to find the links (they're in green, towards the right side of the page).

Some Promising Freebies

Here are four of the most promising freebies I came across on TeachersPayTeachers.com this week:

• Math Brain Teasers by Games 4 Learning (this is the same gal who runs the MakingMathMoreFun.com web site) -- math brain teasers aimed at grades 1-3, but some of these could be used with older students, too
• You Can Even Read a Cereal Box by Cynthia Vautrot -- fun literacy activities with a cereal box, aimed at grades 1-4
• Add It Up by The Engineer -- a template for creating self-grading math or science activities (using questions with numerical answers), aimed at grades 6-12, but usable with any students who can add lists of numbers
• Place Value with Large Numbers by Math Coach's Corner -- differentiated activities for place value, aimed at grades 3-6

Making Math More Fun

Teresa over at MakingMathMoreFun.com released her latest magazine yesterday (look under the 9 August heading; if you get to 26 July, you've gone too far), collecting several fun back-to-school activities and other ideas for math lessons / games. If you're looking for ways to change things up in your K-5 math class, her magazines usually have something you can use.

Updated links

As we're getting back to school, I updated several of my Symbaloo webmixes to make them more useful for myself and my students. Check out my Math Games, Math Resources, and Educational Research (formerly only for protocols and thinking routines) pages, and hopefully you'll find something useful for you, too!

Elementary Resources

For my friends at the elementary level, I have collected the specifically K-5 resources I had scattered across my Symbaloo pages onto a single webmix for you. It is linked from my "Other Resources" page above, or you can check it out directly at: http://www.symbaloo.com/embed/elementaryresources1.

A Cartesian Cartoon...

Today I was looking through some student work I still have from over 6 years ago on Cartesian Cartoons. If this is an activity you haven't done before with your students, you don't know what you're missing! To get just a taste, give this one a try:

Graph the following sets of points, connecting each new point to the previous one as you go. When starting a new set, it does not connect to the last point on the previous set. Set 1: (3,12), (4,13), (10,13), (11,12), (11,4), (10,3), (4,3), (3,4), (3,12). Set 2: (5,11), (6,11), (6,9), (5,9), (5,11). Set 3: (8,11), (9,11), (9,9), (8,9), (8,11). Set 4: (4,6), (5,5), (9,5), (10,6), (4,6). Just for fun, color your design!

Now that you know how to do a Cartesian Cartoon, the next step (obviously...) is to make your own set of points for someone else to graph. Draw out your design on grid paper, keeping track of the coordinates of each point and how your points connect, then give it to someone else and see what they come up with. Who knew coordinate graphing could be so much fun?! :)

For more fun with coordinate graphing, see http://www.worksheetworks.com/math/geometry/graphing.html.

Google Search Stories Video Creator

Today, a colleague shared with me an idea for having 1st graders share biographical information they were learning using Google Search Stories. Their projects looked like a lot of fun, so I made one about my coaching resources page: