Valentine's Day, SEL, and Math All Rolled Into One

Sunday, February 9, 2020

Just a quick post to share some Valentine fun.  Anne and I found a new Valentine candy-heart math activity to use with our students.  Most years, we give each student a box of conversation hearts and have them use the candy to practice graphing, comparing numbers with symbols, and division.  However, this year we decided to combine this new math activity with some SEL.  We wanted to have students work in groups of 4 knowing they may struggle with sharing and working together.  Candy does that. :)  So, before beginning the lesson, we had a class meeting to discuss some pluses (pros)  and some deltas (cons) about working together in a cooperative group.  We reviewed Habit #6 Synergize and Habit #4 Think Win Win.  Then, the students decided which delta they would be mindful of during the activity, and if they noticed it creeping up they would gently bring themselves back to synergizing and thinking win-win.   

We cannot believe this is free on TpT!  It's so good.

This bundle is perfect for our students because it involves gathering data in a tally table, creating line plots, finding fractions, determining probability, multiplying, dividing, finding the mean, median and mode, and a challenging word problem to solve.  There is something for students of all math levels to enjoy.

So proud of how well everyone worked together and cooperated.

Close-Up!

Everyone was focused, engaged, and having fun.

Thinking hard!

After we complete the activities on Monday, we told the students we would use the hearts to create a Valentines Day pin.  We do these each year and they are definitely a hit.

This one is a little old.  My newer one was eaten by someone I love dearly.  I'll leave it at that.  :))))

Other fun activities we will do this week include a Valentine logic puzzle, writing Valentine poems to our principal, and reading Love, Z and making an area robot.  Cannot wait for tomorrow.

Another freebie.

This frame is from the notsowimpyteacher blog.  I will change it to "I like you more than..."

This is an adorable book with a heart-felt message about love.

Below is one other area Valentine's Day activity we hope to do this week.

We want to now solve area and perimeter problems in the same lesson.

Happy Valentine's Day!
Kim and Anne