Wow, I can't believe it's already August. Doesn't it seem like summer just flew by? I want to take a moment to show you a little reading and hands-on activity I did with one of my third-grade tutoring students this past week. As I mentioned previously, he is completely enthralled with World War II. I posted a cool World War II website on the blog last week, and I used one of the activities from it last Tuesday.
We read a section from the site called "The Blitz". It told about air raids (which my student had tons of background knowledge about), blackouts, and gas masks. The site is interactive so we were able to click on different photographs and read about them, too. It kept him very engaged. But, we had the most fun when we read the directions on how to make a gas mask and then made one! My student said it was the coolest thing he had ever made. That made me smile!
My friend and colleague, Margaret, is moving from teaching 5th grade to teaching 8th grade next year. I told her about this site, and she is going to check it out and see if she can use it with her students. So, if any of you have friends or colleagues who teach World War II tell them about this site.
The rest of the week I worked with my other tutoring students on math. With the third graders, I have been using resources from Interactive Sites For Education, Map Practice by RIT, K-5 Math Teaching Resources from a Common Core Newsletter, and logic puzzles by Aims Education. The Interactive Sites allowed my students to use games to practice multiplication and division facts. We are going to begin the year with multiplication problem-solving so they need a good head start on memorizing their facts. Map Practice by RIT gave them some practice with algebra, which was pretty cool.
The Common Core Resources had one and two-step word problems for my students to solve. The two-step problems are tricky and they need lots of practice with them so they can be ready for the really complex problem-solving we are going to be doing in third grade. This site also has games to play and literature that can be used to teach math concepts. Next week I'm going to use Six Dinner Sid.
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| Sample story problems. |
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| Here is a problem one girl solved. First we underlined and discussed what each of the numbers meant. Then, she drew a picture to solve the problem. After, we wrote an equation to match what she did in the picture. |
The logic puzzles by Aims Education were fun. They require students to use deductive reasoning skill and to think more flexibly in order to solve them.
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| These are two of the logic puzzles I chose to use with my students. |
With my fifth-grade student I used some YouTube videos to review how to find percentages. A game at MathPlayground helped her review algebra, as did Bracket Basics. Both of these sites were a hit with her!
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We did Algebra Puzzle. Very fun!
Another resource I want to share with you is one I found late last spring. It's called Music for Management. Since I found this so late in the school year I did not use the music ideas with my students, but I plan to this year. The TV Theme Song link looks really good. It looks like it helps manage transition times, talkative students, wrap up times and more. From what I've read, it seems like playing music works magic!
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| When you are at the home page, click on Music Central on the right to get here. |
Finally, just this morning, I found a great site called 53 Ways To Check For Understanding. I love resources like this because it keeps me fresh in the interactive activities I ask my students to do to demonstrate their understanding. I especially want to try numbers 17, 18, 19, 20 and 21. These seem like fun and engaging activities that allow students to recompose their knowledge. I talked about the importance of that last week.
I hope you find these resources helpful as you begin to think about your new school year.
Kim and Anne
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