Our Secret is Out! We made sock monkeys today!

Remember that cute little monkey that has been at the base of all our Language Learning lessons this month, the 75 year old Curious George?  Today the students got a chance to make their own little monkeys, using a pattern that's been around for a long time:

These socks were originally made by the Nelson Knitting Mills in Rockford, Illinois (hence the name) since 1890, and patented in 1915. When the company decided to include sock monkey instructions with every pair of the Red Heel® socks in the 1950’s, the true marketing magic began. 

The pattern was published in a craft magazine in 1955, and in 1958, the first book dedicated to sock monkeys was published. By then, elephant instructions were published as well, and sock monkeys became an important part of every American childhood.

As with every activity that we do, there is always a tie-in to an academic outcome.  Tomorrow, the students will look back at the pattern that I will provide for them and they will be writing out the directions on how to make these monkeys.  There will be an opportunity to revisit the new vocabulary that we learned, and remember which steps come first, second and so on!

Thanks to the two mommas, and two grandmas who came in to help.  We never could have managed without them!  There were challenges along the way:

a) how to turn a sock right-side out

b) how to stuff the batting right to the tip of the tail

c) how to pin the different body parts onto the body (without drawing blood!)

d) how to use a needle and thread, without getting it all tangled up

e) how to make the pair of socks actually look like a monkey!

Probably my favourite line was from a little girl after her monkey was complete.  She looked at her monkey and exclaimed, "How did we ever do this?"

Each and every monkey, whether it was made from a pair of men's work socks, a pair of socks that a child in grade two would wear, a pair of fuzzy socks or a pair of colourful stretchy knee socks, was finally completed, with google eyes and a colourful ribbon added.

Just because I have nothing to do at night (ha! ha!) each monkey also got a little gift of a flannelette blanket (with sock monkeys on it) and a little cup to sip on before bedtime.  It will, hopefully, be one of those days that the students in my class remember for a long, long time.

The other exciting event today was our Cup Stacking Tournament.  There were three possible areas to enter in:

a) singles

b) pairs

c) teams

We had lots of winners today!  The gals above won first place in the pairs competition for Grades 1 and 2,

here's the 2nd place pair,

and here's the third place pair.

Yes! You saw right...Grade Two Girls Rule!

Here's the first place team for the teams challenge for Grades 1 and 2,

and the second place team in the same division.  Great job kiddos!

In case you're not sure of what cup stacking is, here's a couple of my kiddos as they were practising last week.  The best part was the perseverance that they learned....never give up!

God Save Our Queen!

It's the 'teachable moments' that sometimes lead to the best discussions in our classroom.  Our dear Queen Elizabeth II turned 90 years old on Thursday, and though I knew I wanted to talk about it with the kiddos, I didn't know it was going to become a math lesson.

Here's what many parents don't know.  Alberta Learning has a Literacy and Numeracy framework.  This means that no matter what subject you are teaching, you as a teacher should be making connections to literacy and numeracy.  Most people know what literacy is, but not as many know what the term numeracy refers to.

I use this definition: the ability to understand and work with numbers

In the USA, NCTM (the big  mathematics council) uses the words

"A person's general understanding of number and operations along with the ability to use this understanding in flexible ways to make mathematical judgements and to develop useful strategies for solving complex problems" when they talk about number sense.

Think about it this way:  numeracy is really putting the math that you know to work for you in the real world.

That's what we did on Thursday.  Real world application for addition and subtraction.

Can you make connections to the open number line work that the students did (think strategy)

and the extension of large number subtraction (think algorithm) and did the work with numbers give a solution (think problem solving)?

I asked the students to use the open number line to find the difference (great vocabulary) between the year that Queen Elizabeth was born and this year.  The student  sharing his thinking chose to start with the smaller number (1926) and move to the larger one (2016).  He also decided that he could make jumps of 20.  I was so, so proud of the young girl who explained to the class why a jump of 10 was all that could be taken between 2006 and 2016.  That is what we aim for...playing with numbers with confidence!

The next student chose to start at 2016 and count back to 1952 to see how many years Queen Elizabeth has been the reigning monarch.  To really show them that they were smarter than they thought they were, we then did the algorithm.  Of course the solution of 64 years was the same as when they used the open number line.  It's important for them to know that there's more than one way to get to a solution.

Thanks for this great opportunity dear Elizabeth!

Long may you reign!

Spring has Sprung!

On the way out on Sunday morning, these crocuses greeted me under my evergreen tree in the front yard.  I also saw my first robin!  Spring is here!

We are moving from the understanding of subtraction of large numbers into using the traditional algorithm for North America.  It will look familiar to you because it is the way that most of us learned to do this calculation.

One more way that we solidified our understanding is to use place value blocks.  The students worked in small groups and talked about what they were doing.  They put 4 tens blocks in the tens column and tried to then subtract 9 from 0.  They saw (visually) that there were no ones, so they broke a ten block into ones and then they still had 40 but it was 3 tens and 10 ones.  Using the new grouping, they were able to do 10 - 9 in the ones column,

and 30-10 in the tens column to arrive at the solution of 21.

Moving onto the paper and pencil task may have some students struggling to transfer this concrete knowledge into the abstract thinking that happens in our heads.

In small groups the students also attempted to create the paper boats out of newspaper that Curious George made in the story Curious George Rides a Bike

It turned out to much more difficult than they thought!

They worked without assistance from an adult to begin with.  It is interesting to see which students have 'staying power' and are willing to keep trying even when things get difficult and which students immediately give up when they are successful.

We want our students to build up the belief that they can succeed if they are willing to try!  If an adult is always coming to the rescue, the child does not develop that resilience and 'I can do it' attitude.

The first step is on the other page, but here's what they were trying to follow.  They learnt that if they did not do a good job of folding on step 2 or 3, their boat would not work out on step 7 or 8.  That means, every step is important.  I can make a connection to the math algorithm here!

Taking your time is also important if...

...you want a boat like George!

Springing forward!

Welcome to April!  Welcome to Spring!  Welcome to the last term of our school year!

Learning to subtract appears to be more challenging for most students than learning to add.  Once students recognize that subtraction is the inverse operation from addition, they are more likely to be able to subtract more efficiently.  For this reason, this week the two open number line strategies that the students are practising are both counting back  and counting on.

Remember that a strategy is a plan of action to reach an outcome.  We ask students to use a strategy that works best for them.  It should be efficient (not take a long time, so counting by 10's in quicker than counting by 1's) and it should make sense to the person using it and of course, it should result in a proper solution.

In the counting back strategy, the largest number (the minuend) is placed on the far right side of the open number line.  The student then 'jumps back the value of the second number (the one you are subtracting is called the subtrahend).  The jumps must equal that number.  Once the jumps are complete, the final landing spot is the solution to the equation, or the difference.  We avoid using the word answer so that students don't see their solution as right or wrong.  We, instead, talk about whether it makes sense.  This goes back to the idea of algebra, and recognizing that the equal sign actually means that the two sides balance.  Think of it this way:  10=3+7   but 10=4+6 as well.

In the counting on strategy, the students who like to add might be more comfortable.  The smallest number (the subtrahend) is placed on the farthest lest side of the open number line.  The student then jumps UP to the value of the largest number (the minuend) to find the difference.  The student must add the jumps that they did to find that difference.  Think of it this way: 3+ ___=10.  What number makes this equation true?

In our first attempt of practising these two different strategies, I had the students write which strategy they were trying.  This one is trying the counting back strategy.  Do the solutions work?

Surprise!  The solutions using the counting on strategy should be the same?  Did this kiddo, match the solutions of the first page?  I can see where more teaching is needed as well as a great deal more practise!