SOLs Covered: 7.PFA.3 Write & Solve Two-Step Equations
Math Topic: 06 Two-Step Equations
Daily Agenda: November 10-14, 2025
Upcoming Assessments: Topic 6 Formative (Tues. 11/18); Unit 3 Expressions & Linear Equations (Wed. 11/19)
Good afternoon! I'm sending this update early during my planning so that I can utilize the afternoon workday to get ahead with planning. While it's always nice for myself to be ahead for all the obvious reasons, I try to get things fully prepped around the holidays so that families that have out of town plans can get materials in advance to help keep the kids on track with their classmates while their out. I'm already planned through December 10th, so students who leave early for fall break and those who might be returning late can get all papers prior to leaving. They'll also need their Chromebooks as there will be digital assignments as well, plus they'll have access to some of the extra support materials I've provided along with the ability to email me with any questions they might have. I'm now trying to plan through the first week of January in preparation for the same in regards to winter break. Students and/or their parents/guardians just need to reach out to let me know what day(s) they'll be out so I can get them set up with everything they need, though I request 24 hours notice to ensure I have time to get things together for them.
In regards to this week's math work, we've continued working with two-step equations throughout the week. We started by looking at how the algebraic properties are applied when solving equations. We looked at how the commutative, associative, and distributive sometimes pop up in our 7th grade equations (most often you only see them when solving multi-step equations that are part of the Math 8 curriculum, but occasionally you see one thrown into our 7th grade work), but we focused more on how the other properties fall into line: equality (or inequality once we get there), followed by substitution, then inverse, then identity, repeating the pattern if the problem is a two-step.
For property questions, we start by looking at already solved equations, but we moved onto solving them ourselves algebraically. While we've been solving equations prior to this, it was done primarily through modeling with algebra tiles or other representations (like our Teddy Grahams and mini marshmallows). Most students have been doing well with this, but I've pointed out to everyone that if you prefer one method over the other (models over written work or vice versa), you can always convert your problem to your preferred method and solve the way you're most comfortable with so long as you are able to convert/match it back to the original format. Moving forward, I'll predominately be working problems out with the kids algebraically rather than modeling myself as that's what they can expect moving forward in subsequent years of math, but I'll still show some modeling and will of course help students who request help with that as needed.
Today we started working on translating verbal statements and sentences into algebraic expressions and equations, or as I like to call it translating from English to "Mathish" and vice versa. This comes with a few tricks as some words can completely twist a problem, some literally (ex. the words "than" and "from" can flip terms around within an expression/equation), but students will also run across scenarios that they might not have the background information from which to draw. We will of course continue practicing these, not just next week but beyond as well, but the best way to help support students with this is by improving reading skills and getting exposure to real world situations (ex. going to the grocery store, working out landscaping/carpentry scenarios like planning for a new deck or fence, etc.).
That should cover everything and it's time to start working with my third block kiddos, so I'm going to call it a wrap here. As always, please feel free to email if you have any questions/concerns. Hope you all have an amazing weekend!