Math

Thursday, 2019-09-19

Yesterday, we finished our first two weeks of 6 Grade Math and I would like to share a few details with you.

First of all, it is an absolute pleasure to work with this group of children. They are quite talented in Math (and not just Math, I am sure), they are curious and energetic! A perfect combination for learning!

Not surprisingly, in the past two weeks we covered a lot of material:

• Curriculum:

  • • The students finished Topic 1 (7 chapters) and Topic 2 (8 chapters) of Envision Grade 6 textbook (see photos)

    • Completed two Topic tests

    • Currently in the middle of Topic 3 (10 chapters)

• Math Olympiads and Logical Puzzle Problem:

  • • We use Math Olympiad Contest Problems Book.

    • The students started working on the first 10 Olympiads (each Olympiad contains 5 problems). I am cherry-picking the problems to support the current topics.

    • Logical Puzzle: The children explored a classical puzzle about a man with a boat, a wolf, a goat, and cabbage. I introduced the problem on the very first day of school and let them think about it. Sometime it takes a few days to solve a good puzzle; we discussed and drew the solution this Tuesday.

• Geometry:

  • • We started exploring Perimeter and Area via Tangram Problems

    • The children tried to build a square using 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 tangram pieces. While building a square with 1, 2, 3, or 4 pieces is easy, building a 5 or 7-piece square is more challenging. And to formally prove that it is impossible to build a 6-piece square is very hard at their level, yet we are almost done with the proof :).

• Our Prizes:

  • • While an interesting Math problem is a prize in itself, occasionally, the children may receive a special prize - a Math Joke. See example below and solve (=read) carefully :).

Last but not least, when looking at the photos of our class whiteboard, you may see topics like

• Movement Break

• Stretching, Perfect Squat

These are not Math problems, these are indeed short movement breaks that we usually take in the middle of a lesson to stretch our muscles and perfect our squats :)

Photos: It's hard to take photos during out busy classes, especially during various activities - Math manipulatives, movement breaks. So there are some photos of the whiteboard or photos of our materials (textbooks, packets) which I take after the class - these are probably not that interesting, but might give you some ideas about the topics the children are studying.

6 Grade Math Class Photos.

Finally, as always, please let me know your thoughts about Math classes and/or the thoughts of your child. The feedback is important in many ways.

Warmly,

Lana