We have been focusing on read alouds and how important they are in developing Reading Comprehension Strategies but we have some great books in our library to help enrich your math concepts as well. Adding a story to your math lessons can really engage the students and give concrete examples of using math in daily life. A story can help reinforce a concept you are trying to teach or introduce a new strategy. Here are a few examples of how you can integrate literature into your math lessons before, during or after you have taught the concept.

And remember – these books are right here in our Quest Library or in our Guided Reading Sets- Count to A Million by Jerry Pallotta – number sense, place value and counting Brian Cleary writes rhyming verse to introduce the concepts of addition and subtraction. Kindergarten and 1st graders will love the funny rhymes and great illustrations. Stop along the way to solve the problems! The 512 Ants on Sullivan Street is a great book for reinforcing the concept that repeated addition is the same as multiplication and it is a fun story, too! There are some great lesson plans on line for this book! Elapsed Time at the Olympics is a fun way to get kids thinking about elapsed time as the learn interesting facts about the Olympics. As you work your way through the book the students can stop and figure out the questions. I know that several teachers have been looking for new ways to help teach elapsed time! Analyzing Data in the Jungle Park Case gets kids interested in graphing and looking at information as they solve real life problems. Higher Level Thinking Skills come into play with this one! Good for 4th and 5th grades. There are even good books for the upper grades. Multiplying and Dividing at the Bake Sale is an interactive book that allows you to stop and solve problems as you read. This type of book is perfect for creating tasks for your students and increasing their Depth of Knowledge!

Kid-friendly, real-life situations put math into action. By showing how we use math every day, teachers finally have an answer to the question, “But when will I ever use this?”

This is just a little sampling of the great resources we have in our library to help our teachers make math more interesting and engaging! Look for more on this topic later! Happy Reading!

A few posts ago I talked about Number Sense and shared a few ideas on how to reinforce this skill with your students. As I have been visiting classrooms lately I have been excited to see many of you using the Number Of The Day activity. Understanding exactly what a number is and how to compose and decompose that number is a foundational skill. If we can teach our kindergarteners and first graders that a number is so much more than just a digit we make the job of computation in the upper grades more meaningful. It is great to see these young mathematicians complete their number of the day by demonstrating expanded notation, place value, tally marks, arrays, even and odd, 10 more, 10 less,…..etc.  Our fantastic Intervention team has even introduced Number of the Day to their students.

Here is an example from Mrs. Hutchinson’s 3rd grade classroom.

   

These students even have to figure out elapsed time! You can create your own or check out Pinterest or just google Number of the Day. Mrs. Hutchinson has seen good progress and increased confidence with this simple daily activity.

Another example of this activity comes from Mrs. Chidester’s 4th grade classroom. She uses a large dry erase poster so that she can change tasks as her students progress and learn new concepts. 

Mrs. Chidester challenges her students with decimals! Her students record their work in their math journals.

The great thing about this activity is that you pick the number and then allow the class time to use THEIR own strategies to complete the task! A great warm-up to lead into math or fluency practice!

A BIG THANKS to these teachers for sharing!

If you have a great Number Sense activity let us know about it. We love to share!

Hello Teachers – We really want to insure that our Quest students have great number sense. Take a look at these great daily activities to get your students thinking. Use one of these ideas or create your own for a self starter. These could make great warm-ups for intervention groups. The Common Core places a strong emphasis on number sense as we start the year. Give this a try and post a comment to let us know what works for your students!