Shake it Up!

August 25, 2017
to Read (
Words)



Summer break has come and gone and a new school year is here.  Why not start it off with a fun math game.  As some of you may know I love looking at pins on Pinterest.  In fact, I think teachers should receive professional development credit for pinning educational pins on Pinterest, but that's beside the point.  While scouring the millions of ideas out there I came across a math game/resource that used products from my favorite store, Dollar Tree!  Of course, it had me at hello, math and Dollar Tree, I was hooked.  The original blog post was by Chrissie at the Undercover Classroom Blog.  She used the seven day pill box from the Dollar Tree to make a easy place value learning tool.  I made my a little different from Chrissie.

So you'll need a $1 pill box from the Dollar Tree, a pair of scissors, duct tape, glue stick, 7 dice, and the free printout label from Chrissie's blog.  


Cut out one set of place value labels


 Glue a label to the inside of the lids of the pill box starting with millions on the Sunday lid.



Place a die in each compartment.  I use 12mm dice that I purchased on Amazon.  I found that the regular size dice did not turn as easily.



Next I add a piece of duct tape to one side on the pill box and fold it over the edges.  Then I added another piece to the other side and fold it over the edges. You want to cover all sides except where you can see the dice.  This is to insure the dice doesn't fall out.





I have the students shake these and work on standard form, expanded form, and written form.  I also took measurements of the inside lid and made my own template so I could make some different pill boxes.  I've also used the pill boxes to make decimal place value pill boxes and comparing pill boxes.





If you would like to use this activity with your students I have created several different pill box label templates in my teachers pay teachers store, just click on the link below.

Pill Box Math
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Lori
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"What's the word?" Decoding Strategies and Activities

January 15, 2017
to Read (
Words)




Let's face it, when I was in school, anytime I came across a word that I did not know in a book I was reading, I could just pause and the teacher would eventually tell me the word.  Unknowingly, that teacher was doing a disservice to me.  Later on, as the text became more instructional in college, I had to learn strategies that I did not have in order to decode and understand the words in my textbooks.  Today, some teachers are still using the same strategies they were exposed to as students themselves.  I was one of those teachers!  Of no fault of our own, all we are doing is creating a society of students who are dependent on others to be successful.  So how can we change this?  Well I have some strategies and activities that you can easily implement in your classroom to help break the cycle.  Let's look at some strategies and activities for younger students first.

 Teachers need to ensure their students have several strategies to choose from when encountering a word they need to decode.  There are several, when I am stuck... posters you can find on Pinterest and teachers pay teachers to use.  Even though the titles for each strategy may be different, the strategies are the same.  

 1. Look at the pictures for clues.
2. Get your lips ready to say the word. 
3. Say the beginning and/or ending sound on the word .
4. Stretch the word out.
5. Look for chunks or parts in the word that you know.
6. Flip the vowel sound.
7. Skip the word and come back to it.

 It's fun to come up with movements or silly faces to help students remember these strategies.  For example, I use fish lips for get your lips ready to say the word.  You can use whatever movements or faces works best for the strategies you pick.  I also suggest sharing the strategies you are using with your colleagues in your building so the kids will be exposed to the same strategies throughout and there will be consistency across the board.

 As for activities to help with decoding, concentrate on word families and CVC words in the early stages.  Then add on CVCe words as well as CVVC words.  Do not forget to include digraphs (2 letters that make 1 sound) and blends (2 letters that keep their individual sound).  Some great activities that can be easily modified for each new sound you are working on are sorts, go fish, matching, and creating words with cups or flip books.

 But what about students in our upper elementary grades who are struggling to decode longer words.  Here's some strategy ideas to help those students as well.

 1. Look for parts you know at the beginning of the word. (prefixes)
2. Look for parts you know at the beginning of the word. (suffixes)
3. Look for root words you know.
4. Look for vowel patterns you know.
5. Break the word into syllables.
6. Split between compound words.
7. Split double letters.
8. Split VCCV patterns.
9. Split after ck or x.

 Some great activities to use for building students confidence with decoding and working with longer words are sorts, building words, and graphic organizers.  Pinterest is a great resource to use to find activities that are appropriate for your students and the phonics skills you are working on.  

 For ideas check out my Pinterest page at www.pinterest.com/welltaughtlife

 Also please leave a comment below and tell me what you use in your classroom to help your students with decoding unknown words.  

 If you like my blog, please share it with your friends and colleagues, and make sure you sign up for emails about my blog.


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Lori
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Dominoes, Cards, and Dice...Oh My!

January 07, 2017
to Read (
Words)
Dominoes, playing cards, and dice are some of the most fundamental math manipulatives a teacher can have on hand.  They can be used for many different content strands throughout all grade levels.  However, storing these great manipulatives in a ready to use container can be overwhelming to some people. There's no need to fear, OCD girl is here to show you some of my budget friendly storage solutions for these manipulatives.  

 If you read my previous blog, "Once Upon a Time," you would have seen pictures of my corner of paradise...aka my workspace.  Though it may be small, it is expertly organized to house as many manipulatives and reading products as possible.  Right beside my kidney shape table, I have two small black bookcases in front of my math bulletin.  I use the top of these bookcases to house some of my math manipulatives in some fabulous large rectangular Dollar Tree baskets.  
Bookcases with baskets of math manipulatives on the top
Four of these five baskets house the biggest part of my dominoes, cards, and dice manipulatives.  Let's first look at dominoes.

Overview of dominoes basket


Within the basket I have some sets of double six dominoes that I won during a drawing at a teacher's workday this summer, some large dominoes that I combined to make storage easier, and some mini-dominoes that I purchased at the Dollar Tree.  With the larger dominoes, I just added them into a Glade-like container that can found at your local grocery store or at a dollar store.  

 One of my favorite items to purchase at the Dollar Tree are mini-dominoes.  In fact, I have a bad habit of stocking up anytime they have some back on the shelves, even though I have several containers full.  The mini-dominoes come in a cardboard box that is easily damaged when you try to open the dominoes for the first time.  A great budget friendly storage solution for these items can be found a few aisles over in Dollar Tree in the plastic storage container section.  I use the snack containers with flip-top lid.  You can find these throughout the year, though finding some without an image on the top can be tricky at times.  The lid has a tight snap to it allowing the person to easily and secularly carry the mini-dominoes wherever necessary and then flip up the lid for easy access to the dominoes.  


 
Playing cards are another great math manipulative that can be purchased cheaply at the Dollar Tree.  In fact, if you play your cards right, you can find double packs of cards in the toy section which means you are only paying $0.50 per a pack.  However, when you purchase the double pack, the cards come in a cardboard box that will easily rip when you open it.  Also, each pack of cards are just wrapped in some cellophane.  So to keep these cards together I use another storage container from the Dollar Tree.

  These double latch snack/soap containers hold a pack of cards easily and keep them secularly locked into the box, so you won't have to worry about playing 52 card pick-up.  Dollar Tree only has these containers available at certain times of the year.  I know you can definitely find them right before school each year.  The containers come two in a pack, and sometimes even three in a pack for $1.



Dice are another great item that can be purchased at the Dollar Tree to be used during your math instruction.  I have found packs of 5 dice or even sometimes packs of 10 dice in the toy section.  If you have spent anytime in a classroom with students using dice, you know they can some how end up across the room or way up in the air.  I wanted a budget friendly storage solution that would keep the dice in ready-to-use containers for math instruction that students could shake to roll the dice.  At first, I found a four pack of storage containers at my local grocery store that ranged in price from $1 to $1.99 a pack.  Those are the containers with the colored lids in the pictures below.  They had a nice snap and latch making if very difficult for the dice to "fall out" of the container without someone first removing the lid.  While walking around my local Dollar Tree one day, I came across the 10 count Sure Fresh mini Start Containers with lids.  While the lids on these containers do not fit as snug as the containers I had found at the grocery store, the Sure Fresh containers work just as well and are a better value with it costing only $0.10 a container.  Lately, my local Dollar Trees have been out of this product, however you can usually find them year around.  They come in both rectangular and circle shaped containers.

 
No matter what containers you use, I want to encourage you to make sure your math toolkit contains these manipulatives.  They are so easy, fun, cheap, and versatile to use.

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Lori
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