A new way of doing things!

Yesterday morning, as the kids were returning to their seats after Calendar Math, I was walking around checking to see if they had shown their work on the homework from the night before. It was a set of 10 place value questions (ie, What is the value of the 5 in 498, 256?), and I had insisted that they show a place value chart for each question before choosing their answer. We had even done the first question and chart together in class the day before.

All of the kids had done their charts except one, A, who had not been doing his homework this year anyway. So that really didn't surprise me.

As I picked up his paper to look on the back, he watched me with a spark in his eye. I of course saw nothing on the back except the one chart that we had done in class, but before I could ask, "Where are your place value charts?" A proudly exclaimed, "I did it a DIFFERENT way!" As if he had independently discovered a new element.

I tried not to be TOO harsh as I told him that merely filling in an answer bubble without doing anything else was not actually a "way" so to speak.

Everything in its Place

My kids really impressed me today. We started talking about Place Value, reviewing what they should know from second grade -- Ones, Tens, and Hundreds. Usually, despite the fact that this is NOT new material, it's like teaching a brand new topic. Today, though, my kids showed me that they had it down cold.

And not just one class! BOTH classes went pretty similarly, and we sailed right through things. I started off by writing the number 979 on the board and asking somebody to read it. I then asked them to discuss with their partners whether or not the two 9's in the number meant the same thing.

I heard great discussions, and in both classes, kids told me that they were not the same because the first 9 was equal to 900 but the second 9 was merely 9. When I asked about the 7 in the middle, a good majority of the kids were able to not only tell me that it represented 7 Tens, but even that that equaled 70!! That's pretty major!!

I busted out the place value blocks, and the kids started modeling 2 and 3 digit numbers. For the most part, they did this with ease, and one great surprise was how well they worked with their partners and did not just play with the blocks (with one or two unsurprising exceptions).

But then I posed a tricky question. I asked them to model 63, which they were able to do easily. I then asked them to show me with the model how we could represent 63 - 5. I asked them to take away 5 cubes from their model.

Most of the kids had difficulty with this one. However, in my morning class, I heard one of my kids immediately launch into a PERFECT explanation to his partner of how they needed to "exchange" one of their ten sticks for ten ones cubes and then they would have 13 ones and they would be able to take away 5.

Color me incredibly impressed. After a few minutes had gone by, and it was obvious that the other kids were stumped, I had that kid come up to the overhead and share his explanation with the whole class.

In the afternoon group, nothing was quite as powerful, but I observed a few groups doing the right thing. When I asked them to explain, it took a little bit of coaxing and drawing it out of them, but they had the right idea.

Tomorrow, we introduce Thousands, and Thursday, we'll introduce Ten Thousands and Hundred Thousands. I can only hope things go as smoothly then!

Ike outside and marching in Place

Thankfully, I do not live on the Gulf coast of Texas, or else I would probably not be able to enjoy my sick weekend at home. As it is, living near Dallas, which is pretty darn far inland, I'm STILL seeing the effects of Hurrican Ike today. It has been raining nonstop all day long, and the wind is quite audible.

Earlier this week, my class and I were going over Place Value. The kids had only learned place value through the thousands (though there was some debate over whether they had stopped at hundreds last year, or thousands), but this year, they have to know it through hundred thousands.

Since my new room this year is MUCH smaller than last year, there just isn't enough space to play Place Ball. Last year, I had the kids run around, slapping the desks as if they were bases, and saying the name of each place as they went. No room for that this year. So instead we marched in "place."

I started the kids marching left, right, left, right, and we shouted out the places in time -- ONES, TENS, HUNDREDS, THOUSANDS, TEN THOUSANDS, HUNDRED THOUSANDS! It seemed to stick that day. We'll see how much remains in a couple of weeks.

Also, my thanks to Peter Jones at Great New Books that are a Must Read for his review of Learn Me Good.

Take me out to the classroom

A few nights ago, as I was trying to fall asleep, I was also trying to think of some ways to get my kids involved in this year in learning basic concepts. I had just read a small article about exercise in the classroom, so I thought maybe incorporating the two might yield some good results.

What my fevered brain conjured up was a new game called Place Ball. Now I use the term "new game" very loosely, as it may very well have been thought of before by greater minds than mine. But it's new to me at the very least.

This is just an idea -- I've never actually put it into play, but I think it might be fun to try this year. We usually cover place value early -- like in the second or third week of school. Place value is something that they should have learned in second, or even first grade, but for some reason, the kids at my school tend to reformat their brains every summer (sometimes they do this over Christmas break, spring break, and weekends as well). So while the concept may remain vaguely familiar, it's still something that many of them struggle with.

So I have two iterations of Place Ball. The first, which could be played indoors or outdoors, is to aid with rote memorization of the place value names and the order they come in. It basically amounts to "running the bases," OR in this new game -- "running the places."

I have my students' desks arranged into five "tables," with each table consisting of four or five individual desks. My overhead machine sits in the center of these tables. I will move this overhead machine over to a position of safety like against the wall or back in a corner, but leave a single desk in the center of the room. Then the five tables and this additional desk will be the six places/bases.

In Texas, third-graders are responsible for learning their numbers up through 999,999 -- so the bases would represent Ones, Tens, Hundreds, Thousands, Ten Thousands, Hundred Thousands. The kids will stand in a line along the side of the room and take turns running the places, calling out the name of each as they tap it with their hand.

I would expect this to be a pretty fun and exciting activity for them, so every time someone has successfully rounded the places, there will be lots of cheering, and any time someone makes a mistake (ie, Ones, Tens, Thousands, Hundreds), I don't think they'll get too down on themselves since they'll be getting plenty of opportunities.

The second iteration is more application. This could be played on a very small scale indoors, but would work much better outdoors. Six kids spread out in a line facing the teacher. Each of these kids represents a place value. The teacher will throw a ball to one of the kids and call out a number. This could be tossing a tennis ball from 5 feet away or throwing a football from 20 feet away. If the teacher calls out THREE and throws the ball to the person in the Hundreds Place, that child is then responsible for remembering that 300 is part of the overall number. The teacher would then throw the ball to another place value and call out another number. At some point, the teacher calls out, "What is your number?" At which point, the kids group together and fit the pieces of their puzzle together to form an overall numeral.

In a large outdoor space, the teacher could be the central point, throwing to multiple lines of children, so it would not be limited to only six kids at a time.

Anyway, that's my idea, and I think it will be very interesting to see how it actually works in practice. I would love to hear feedback on this idea, from anyone who has done something similar, or just from anyone who has thoughts about Place Ball.

At the very least, I expect it to be fun, enlightening, and free of steroid accusations...