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Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Multiplication Sundaes



For as long as I've taught 3rd grade, our kids have had difficulty memorizing their math facts. Each year we have an incentive to give them a little boost. We build a "Gingerbread House" for addition facts (look for my previous post in December for this) the first part of the year, and we do what we call the "Multiplication Sundae" the second half of the year.

We start on the x 0's and x 1's and work our way up to the x 12's. Our students earn a piece of the sundae for every multiplication fact set that they make a 90% or better on. For example, they earn a bowl if they make a 90% or better on their 0's & 1's, a spoon for their 2's, a scoop of ice cream for their 3's, a cherry for 10's, and so on. If they earn ALL of them, they get EVERYTHING on their sundae. And we ALWAYS have a SURPRISE (usually for the 12's). It could be Magic Shell, or a "waffle cone bowl", or anything else we can think of that would be SuPeR yummy!

I have created this monster of a unit called Monstering Multiplication Facts to help make these timed tests and memorizing these facts a little less scary. The monsters give tricks for memorizing multiplication facts from 0 to 12. This unit also includes timed tests for facts from 0-12, as well as answer keys. There are 30 problems for each fact and we usually give them 2 minutes to complete the page.












This unit is available for $6.00 at either my TpT or TN store.

We have tried other activities as well. There are an abundance of CD's with rock and rap songs about multiplication facts, flash cards, "around the world", and fortune tellers, to name a few. Whatever it takes to get them motivated to memorize! I hope this gives you some ideas on what you can do to help motivate your kiddos!

Happy Multiplying!!!

Thursday, March 22, 2012

HUGE GIveaway!!!



Life In Special Education

My friend Karla over at Life in Special Education is having a HUGE giveaway as a "thank you " to all of her followers. It is a multi-teacher/blog giveaway with over $80 of amazing teaching resources and I must say I am honored to be participating! Head on over to her blog by clicking on the link under the picture and find out how you can WIN!!!

Wednesday, March 21, 2012

New Easter Freebie!



Come check out an "eggcellent" way for your students to learn and / or review the skill of identifying numbers as odd or even! You can use this unit as a mini-lesson or as a center. Just hop on over to my Teachers NB or TPT store and pick up your very own copy.
Hoppy Easter!




A Series of 3rd Grade Events

Monday, March 19, 2012

Spring Break is Over.....What a Day!


Graphic by KPM Doodles


Spring Break is officially over!

The alarm clock goes off @5:30 AM, YUCK!!! TOO EARLY... I think to myself.

Get ready, head to school, and someone's in my parking space, and of course pulls out just as I park.

Get to school, head to the copier, and there's not enough pink paper (no white paper at all)!

Get the keys to the supply room, get pink & white paper (thinking of others). Only have enough time to make 2 sets of copies (need 3), so leave a message to copy 3rd set.

Announcements are late, Talented and Gifted Students need to hurry and do their ABC Order before TAG teacher picks them up at 7:45AM.

TAG teacher comes and only one student is finished. Others soon follow except one. Didn't event realize he hadn't left until another student made a comment. TAG student wasn't even doing ABC Order, he was reading. So.... he had to do ABC Order and went to TAG almost an hour late.

The room is nice and quiet. Everyone reading, taking AR Tests, passing out mail, stapling spelling tests in planners........ until the TAG kids come back.

They quiet down after clapping to attention, then we begin reading about E. B. White, because we are going to read Charlotte's Web. We are talking about how long ago the book was written and one of my TAG kids says "What color was your hair when you were born?" I asked him what did that have to do with the book, and he said it was because I said it was written before I was born. Welcome to my world.

Tell students to do fill-in-the-blank author quiz. One student turns it in and put that White used to be an editor and a niece. "Niece?", I said. "Don't you have to be a girl to be a niece?" He just rushed through it as usual.... I go ahead and give him his grade (he doesn't deserve a higher grade for rushing), but tell the rest of the class to PROVE their answers BEFORE turning in their papers.

Kiddos go to PE... Ahhhhh.... quiet.....for 45 minutes......

Kiddos come back, we watch a video about life cycle and inherited traits. Of course the s_ _ word came up, several times (giggle, giggle, whisper, whisper....).

Line up to go to lunch twice (line up twice, not go to lunch twice) because they have forgotten how to line up quietly.

Go to lunch. Decide that it is very cloudy, but not wet yet so we can go outside. Come in early because it is beginning to drizzle.

Start warm up. Getting loud again. No one has glue sticks (as usual). Clap to quiet down. Go over word problem concerning subtraction and fractions (which we have already covered). When asked what the fraction of green markers was, one student says "3". I tell him that is NOT a fraction (of course we just went over what the definition of a fraction was).

Begin math lesson on graphing with a video...NOT. Was only able to watch about a minute and then it started "buffering". I hate when it BUFFERS!!! So, have to go to plan B, wing it!

Bell rings, some people already packed, others dilly dallying with finishing their graph questions... Hurry up and pack. Can't find the bus slip (teacher that prints it has a sub).
Find form on computer, print it, and walk kids down the hall to the bus.

Wait until all the car riders leave. AND THEN go get my testing manual and a pen, so I can be prepared for a State Testing Meeting after school. My grade level doesn't test until April, but we all have to train now because upper grades start to test next week.

Meeting finally over around 3:45PM. Go back to my room and start to get ready to leave. Have to go to the little girl's room.. darn. Go and come back. Get everything ready. Realize I need to photo copy something for tomorrow (Don't want to take the chance the copier doesn't work tomorrow AM). Then head out the door @ 5:00 PM.

Yep, Spring Break is officially over!