Area Robots

In math, the 2nd graders have been learning about area and perimeter.  Yesterday we made area robots.  The students created a robot on grid paper and then counted up the area for each body part.  I love how they all end up so unique to the student who created it!

Bunny Measurements

We just created the cutest bunnies to help us practice our measurement skills.  The students drew and used water colors to paint a bunny.  Then they had to find the measurements in centimeters for the body, stomach, ears, eyes, nose, whiskers, and teeth.  This math project has certainly made our room feel ready for spring!

Polygon Robots

We've learned in math that polygons are closed shapes with straight sides.  We had some fun with this skill and made polygon robots.  The trickiest part was making sure that our shapes had straight sides. The students were very creative with their ideas and had a lot of fun with this project!

Odd and Even Math Monsters

While studying what makes numbers odd and even, the students were able to get creative and put their odd and even math skills to use.  The class created creatures that could include any body parts they could imagine up.  They had to record 4 odd and 4 even body parts.  There were a variety of ideas brainstormed: eyes, mouth, nose, arms, legs, horns, heads, tail, teeth, wings, stripes, polka dots, and many more!  This project is so much fun!

Doubles Rap!

We've had a blast practicing our doubles facts using a fun rap made by a group of teachers and posted online.  We used their music in the background as we practiced our facts off the smart board.  On Friday the students brought in their best rap accessories to make our doubles rap video.
(I'm working on getting the video posted to our blog.  Due to some computer problems it wasn't possible to get it posted over the weekend.)

Math Stations

Last week the class was slowly introduced to our math stations: teacher time, assignment station, and game/partner work.  We worked on a "Math About Me" project to learn about teacher time and assignment station.  The students began to learn a few math games to practice cooperative work expectations with a partner.

Today we had all of our stations up and running.  During each math block we have three rounds.  Each student will always see me for the math lesson for a round, work on their assignment in a different round, and the final round includes a partner game, using the online math program Moby Max on the computer, playing a math game on an iPad, playing a math game with a partner, or solving math problems in our math folder center.

I love using this approach for our math block because it allows me to see small groups of students instead of teaching a lesson to all 23 students at the same time.  It gives me the chance to differentiate the instruction when needed and give support to those students who may initially struggle with a new skill.  They did a fantastic job today with our stations!