Hidden Gems: Fractions=Trouble!

This week's Hidden Gem is a math mentor text that is really so much more. "Fractions=Trouble!" is a gem in my book because it confronts the issue of learning a difficult topic, social adjustments to accepting help when you need it, and exploding pickles!

First, any text about fractions is a benefit to most of my students in grades 3 through 10. No matter how well these kids have done in math, it seems fractions give them a hard time. Wilson is a great kid, who just doesn't seem to get it, no matter how hard he tries. I love it though, that as things start to make sense, he starts to fractions in just about every part of his everyday life.

Second, the main character, Wilson, is getting a math tutor for the first time and he emotionally expresses his concerns. We get to walk alongside this young man as he comes to terms with accepting help and not being ashamed of his own weaknesses. I also love the strategy the tutor uses, very much like my own.

Finally, Wilson also explains in a realistic tone his frustration with trying to focus on a subject he's not good at and is not at all interested in. He tries so hard to pay attention in class so he can pass the test and not need the tutor after all. But we all know how well that works out, doodles and staring off into space tell him it's not so easy to focus on something that doesn't make sense to you.

What a fine text for most of the students I work with (especially those who are both math and reading students!). If after reading this with your students, you think they could use a little more help understanding fractions you can check out this resource, and here's a free game that will help them build their fraction number sense.

Amy, over at Teaching Ideas 4 You has written about a few Hidden Gems she uses with her class, And Caitlin at The Room Mom has as well, check them out, you might find a new gem you never knew you couldn't live without!

Creating a Learning Tribe

I recently guest blogged over on Education to the Core about creating Learning Tribes for our students. If you've read that article and are looking for more information, you've found the right place. If you haven't, you might like to go check it out. 

A Little More Background on Learning Tribes:

Let’s not get this tribe confused with the official movement of Tribes Learning Communities pioneered by Jeanne Gibbs. However, I’d like to quote from a TLC trainer because the fundamentals are the same.  “Indigenous people consider the word “tribe” a formal word with special relational meaning often defining similarities and uniqueness. …the word came into use as the name for the developmental learning process developed by Jeanne Gibbs. This process is a way of being together helping each other teach our children to live a life based on time honored values in caring, safe and supportive environments. … The informal definition (also from the Cambridge Dictionary) defines the meaning as “a large family or other group that someone belongs to.” The process known as “Tribes” helps us to create “belonging” for children in schools and other organizations.” (Ron Patrick, http://tribes.com/about/)

Taking the points from that explanation, a learning tribe is a collaborative community surrounding the student. Teachers, parents, tutors, coaches, and even therapists, all united in an effort to teach the child, and create safe environments for learning. I love the Cambridge definition, and it fits well with the purpose of this effort. Imagine students who once struggled with the very basic concepts, belonging to a large family of trusted adults who want the best for them and who work together to provide the needed supports and encouragement. 

What does an effective learning tribe look like?

A learning tribe requires all members of the child’s tribe to be on the same page, to know what is needed to bring him to the next level, to understand why she is struggling the way she does.

If a student has a tutor, it’s helpful to know what skills are being worked on in the class, where the student struggles the most, and what is coming up next. Many tutors are capable and willing to front load difficult vocabulary and concepts, thus creating background experiences for the classroom teacher to draw on during content lessons. It’s also helpful for the tutor know about behavioral incentive programs and how they work, we can encourage our student to reach his goals, and help her discover areas of the day where she could apply her focusing strategies.

Likewise, counselors and therapists can use some information from the classroom during their sessions. Again, the behavioral programs and issues. They also benefit from hearing the positives from the day/week/month. If they have some positive feedback to work with, the counselors and therapists can help struggling students focus on what they are doing right and set goals to keep it up, or even apply that to other areas of their life.

I’m always struggling to find the answer to what benefits the classroom teacher. I’ve had teachers ask me if our student is capable of doing certain things on their own, what scaffolding I’ve been using, and what coping strategies we’ve developed (mostly for my special needs kiddos). Since it’s usually difficult for me to open this line of communication, I thought it’d be fun to write a little parody. I'm still working on it, the lyrics are done, and most of the recording complete. We are just waiting for a little warmer weather (it was 17 degrees this morning) to shoot the video. I will post it as soon as it's complete!

In the meantime, if you have a minute, pop over to fill out a super quick survey that will help me, and other tutors, know exactly what information to communicate to our students’ classroom teachers. I will compile the responses and post them as soon as there are enough to make a post.

Guided Notes versus Interactive Notebooks

I absolutely LOVE using interactive notebooks in various capacities with just about every subject/content area I've tried. But there's always that one student who just can't keep up. Is there some written code that says all students' notebooks have to look the same? I thought so, but I had to figure something else out to benefit these lower functioning students.

This past few weeks I've been experimenting with guided notes, rather than flippable notes. The idea is still the same, get the students interacting with their lessons. However, there's a lot less to keep track of, and my precious students aren't getting lost in the assembly process.

Take a look at a couple of examples from this recent fraction lesson. We are developing number sense with fractions, learning the different parts of and types of fractions and how they work together.

The key for me is the notebook itself. These guided notes require a three-ringed binder rather than a typical spiral notebook. I'm sure I could adjust the size of printing to reduce the pages to a size that could be glued to a spiral notebook page. I'm just not fond of the way that looks, and it reduces the amount of blank space the student has for writing his notes.

Another thing that I learned (the hard way) is that this method works best if the guided notes are punched to lay on the left side of the notebook, so practice pages can be inserted to lay on the right side. This way, the student has his notes right there and ready, and he doesn't have to struggle to write around the binder rings.

Since this has worked out so well with my current students, I'm going to be revising my previous interactive notebooks to offer a guided notebook version. If you think you'd like to use these with your students, I currently have the fractions packet above in my store. I'll be adding Skip counting and division soon. If you leave a comment with the content areas you'd love to have, when I make it, I'll send you a complimentary copy!

Multiplication Strategies Part 2

I decided to continue the multiplication strategies post in separate posts so I can make each one it's own thought. I'll compile a master a list. If you haven't already read Part 1 on using the distributive property, you can read it here.

A quick reminder: I do NOT advocate rote memorization, what you will find here is not "tricks" to memorize facts. Rather, I believe in helping make learning abstract concepts relate to real world experiences. You will find here, tips and ideas that will help make learning come alive and retrievable.

2. Make Something. 

You read that right, make something, anything. This is a great tip if your student is a natural kinesthetic learner, if he is a creative type, and/or if she has body and spatial smarts. No matter which theory you use, making something will grab hold of more than one area of the students mind. He will be using his logic capacities as he solves problems, creativity as he designs his masterpiece, and if you set the environment up for it, he will also engage his emotional mind as he feels good about his work. Activating all of these neurologic centers immediately creates more mental connections from the abstract to the concrete.

But Miss Stefany, I'm not a creator, what can we make to help learn our math facts? Math is not art class!

I hear you, but I'm going to ignore that comment about math and art, they are very much related! ;)

Here are a couple of ideas to get you started creating with your math students.

Arrays are one of the first models students learn to connect with multiplication. So these first couple activities focus on the array model.

• Punch holes in scrap paper with a hole punch. I cannot take credit for this idea, I recently found it on Pinterest, posted by The Primary Theme Park. I took this idea and ran with it with one of my autistic students this week. I have to say, this little guy does not have the fine motor skills to make his rows and columns look all neat and pretty, BUT, it made sense to him, it was easy for him to count and see the relation betweeen 8 x 3 and 3 x 8, and he laughed and had fun while he worked away.

• Make Playdough models. I've done this for years, and a few years ago I had a little boy who wanted to take pictures of everything. He said pictures stay in his mind longer (he didn't have a real camera). I made this little paper cutout of a camera, and he held it up to his face and "snapped" a picture of the arrays or other figures we created. It was very important that he said "Click" when he snapped his mental picture. I'm still not sure if this was scientifically necessary, so you might want to encourage your students to follow through all the way as well ;) 

After either of these activities, I like to have students write out the facts they are working on onto a take home card. This is a large index card that goes home with them each week with their facts at the top and the arrays under them. The cards never come back to class, and I can only hope that my students share these cards with their family and continue to think about them throughout the week.

Another familiar multiplication model is equal groups. Students have been learning the basic of skip counting since first grade. These next few activities use the skip counting equal groups model.

• Make a mini-book of facts. You might be familiar with lapbooks or interactive notebooks, homeschoolers and teachers love these because they work! My first use of these mini-books for math was a free resource available on Homeschoolshare. It's simple, easy to assemble, and versatile for many different learners. Being the creative type that I am, I eventually had to make a themed one for myself uh-hem, for my students ;). It's got a race car theme and was super fun for my second and third grade boys. The mini-books are great because kids actually want to revisit them, they'll play with them, and show them off to parents and siblings. When they are that excited about something, the energy has to be transferred to the skill they are developing, in this case, multiplication facts!

                               

• Make your own flashcards. They don't have to be fancy, or printed out using flashy graphics. Just write a fact at the top of an index card, have your student draw a picture of equal groups to show the skip counting, then write the answer on the back of the card. Yes, using flashcards to learn the facts is a form of rote memorization, however, the act of drawing out the picture provides a visual cue to a memory of the fact already stored, thus focusing on retrieval rather than repeated filing. 

This last set of activities has to do with bringing multiplication into the real world. Sometimes, all students need is a good reason to learn the facts. 

• Build a model of dream house. Start with drawing out the plans on grid or graph paper.  This can lead to discussions about painting the walls (you'll need to figure out area for that!) and laying carpet (More area), and perhaps building a posch (Yup, you guessed it, more area). Then if your student is up for it, you can move into purchasing supplies and building the scale model, they will feel accomplished and have something to show for all of that hard work!

• Feed an army. Not literally of course, unless you have one to feed. Take a trip to the grocery store, either in real life or through the pages of the weekly advertisements or online options. Shop for x number of guests, buy supplies to make x servings of each dish. While you're at, make it even more real life and calculate the cost of this meal! Maybe your little mathematician will get a philanthropic bone and be moved to give of his time at a local soup kitchen!

There is no magic fix for learning multiplication facts, but if you apply a few of these strategies your students will surely be on the road to mastery!