PACING = First 5 days of school
Choose your own maths adventure with our interactive tools that allow you to build a custom playlist of inspirational maths activities and messages! To build your WIM week, select one video, one resource for creating a positive maths community, and one task per day and add to your playlist. Then click “See Summary” to play videos, download materials and save/share your WIM week! Check out these pre-made playlists curated by the youcubed team for first grade, middle school and high school and share your playlist on social media with #myWIM!
Share the “Why” with Students: Give the students the rationale behind the Math Talk. Let them know that they have great thinking that we can't see and this gives them a chance to share what's going on in their brains. This also gives everyone a chance to learn from each other lots of different ways we can think about a problem.
Initial Implementation : As you begin to implement Math Talks in your classroom, you will want to keep them simple. Your goal might be to have 2 or 3 students share their thinking, which you capture and record without much comment or questioning.
● Provide a safe environment. ● Start with easier problems so that students can learn the routine and to encourage wide participation.
● Present calculation problems horizontally. ● Provide quiet think time and a silent signal. ● Accept, respect, and consider all answers.
● Capture student thinking as faithfully as you can. ● Write the student’s name so that you can refer to _______’s strategy.
● Develop your poker face. Respond neutrally to students’ comments.
More information: Number Talk "Look fors" Math Talk Process Tips for Number Talks
Suggested Talks to get started:
Days 1-2: Dot Talks (choose one image per day)
Questions: How many do you see? How do you see them?
Suggested Steps:
Quickly show one of the dot images so students do not have time to count. Have students show a thumbs-up to the chest if they think they know how many dots. Depending on the number of students who are showing you a thumbs-up, you may wish to show it a second time.
Solicit student responses, right or wrong.
Have students do a Turn-and-Talk to discuss how they saw the dots.
Have a few students share how they saw the dots. Make several copies of the Dot Talk in order to record student thinking by circling the groupings they identify, and writing the corresponding equation. Record students’ names on the copies.
Summarize the Math Talk by connecting the equations to each other and to the dots.
Days 3-5 Number Strings
Question/Prompt: How much? How do you know?
Show the first expression, allow for discussion of a few strategies, then show the next expression. Do as many expressions from one string as time and interest allow. You do not have to do all of the problems in the string in one day.
Day 3
3 x 7
3 x 0.4
3 x 7.4
4 x 0.8
4 x 2.8
Day 4
50 x 4
0.5 x 4
5.5 x 4
0.6 x 9
2.6 x 9
Day 5
34 x 6
0.5 x 6
34.5 x 6
28 x 3
28.5 x 3
Ready Teacher Toolbox- Lessons 0 for the first five days: Lessons to launch to review key concepts to prepare for the start of the school year and familiarize students with the flow of the Try-Discuss-Connect instructional routine.
Tech First 10 Days: gr6-8
Youcubed: Day 1: The Many Ways We See Mathematics
Day 1 begins with a film that explains how our brains grow and change. After the film all grade level students are asked to do the same dot card number talk. We chose this because we believe all learners should experience the different ways we see and visualize numbers. We use these number talks with people of all ages including college students and CEO’s of companies; they are powerful and thought provoking. The dot card is followed by an important activity to help students work well in groups. We also included a rich activity that shows students another open and creative way to try to fill an area with squares. Content: Area, number sense, visualizing, numbers representations
Ready Teacher Toolbox- Lessons 0 for the first five days: Lessons to launch to review key concepts to prepare for the start of the school year and familiarize students with the flow of the Try-Discuss-Connect instructional routine.
Tech First 10 Days: gr6-8
Youcubed: Day 2: Mistakes are Beautiful Things
Day 2 begins with a film explaining that mistakes are powerful. Grades 3 – 12 will experience an adaptation of one of our favorite lessons from our 2015 summer camp curriculum. This activity asks students to read and understand an interesting graph without numbers. After students discuss the meaning of the graph, they will have opportunities to create their own graphs. Content: Graphical interpretation, graphical representation, represent and interpret data
Ready Teacher Toolbox- Lessons 0 for the first five days: Lessons to launch to review key concepts to prepare for the start of the school year and familiarize students with the flow of the Try-Discuss-Connect instructional routine.
Tech First 10 Days: gr6-8
Youcubed: Day 3: When You Believe, Amazing Things Happen
Day 3 begins with a film showing students that the beliefs they have about themselves and their learning potential changes the way their brain works. Grades 3-12 will work on a shapes task where they will first work visually on completing the pattern. After students share the different ways they see the pattern growing they will work to extend and generalize what they have made sense of. Content: Number sense, number representation, algebraic thinking, generalization, pattern recognition, forming an algebraic expression, algebraic equivalence
Ready Teacher Toolbox- Lessons 0 for the first five days: Lessons to launch to review key concepts to prepare for the start of the school year and familiarize students with the flow of the Try-Discuss-Connect instructional routine.
Tech First 10 Days: gr6-8
Youcubed: Day 4: Conjectures, Creativity and Uncertainty
Day 4 begins with a film that shares a very important message for all math learners, speed is not important in mathematics learning and success. Grades 3-12 will experience a task we are really excited about. Students will explore an unsolved mathematics problem by generating number strings and making conjectures about the patterns they see. We have added links for you to find out more about this interesting problem and why they are called hailstone numbers. All Hail the Elephant! Content: Number sense, pattern recognition, generalization, forming conjectures, addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division of numbers
Ready Teacher Toolbox- Lessons 0 for the first five days: Lessons to launch to review key concepts to prepare for the start of the school year and familiarize students with the flow of the Try-Discuss-Connect instructional routine.
Tech First 10 Days: gr6-8
Youcubed: Day 5: Engaging Our Visual Pathways
Day 5 starts with a film showing students the importance of thinking about maths visually. 6-12 will work on a very rich task that we call: Painting Youcubed. This task provides students with an opportunity to see and use cubic measures, connecting them with abstract mathematical expressions. You can easily extend this task beyond one class period and we have shared some ideas for doing that. Content: Number sense, pattern recognition, area, volume, surface area, shapes, algebraic thinking, generalization, forming an algebraic expression, algebraic equivalence
“Closure in a lesson does not mean to pack up and move on. Rather, it is a cognitive activity that helps students focus on what was learned and whether it made sense and had meaning.” How the Brain Learns Mathematics (2007) P. 104
There are many ways to wrap up and reflect the day's activities but this step is often overlooked or rushed. Purposely plan and allow time for students to have closure each day (even if it means setting a timer or daily alarm so you don't run out of time).
Ideas for closure activities