Daily Review: A key to success in elementary math

The first few weeks of school have been pretty great. We've done a ton of team-building/getting-to-know-you activities and I think the students are really starting to bond as a unit. We are slooowwly inching towards the more academic side of things and I think it will prove to be quite interesting. The learning needs of this year's students are extremely diverse, so incorporating differentiation daily will be a must.

One routine that I think will be key to math success for all students this year is a daily review.

Original photograph via Free Images

But, why is it so important to review daily?

One reason for me is, frankly, our math program. Is yours like ours? Split into separate units with seemingly no overlap? I feel like that segmentation just doesn't work for us, because that is not how math works. We don't learn place value at the beginning of the year and then never see it again - we see it constantly.

From place value to basic operations, we constantly have to rely on those foundational skills that we learned weeks, months, or even years ago. Just like any other skill, math skills need to be used and practiced to keep them in top form. If our math program does not provide students with the opportunity to practice the basics, we must find a way to give students that opportunity, and daily review is a perfect example.

Because it reviews previously taught concepts, a daily review also provides students with plenty of opportunities to fill in gaps in their skill set. Not all students are going to grasp each concept the first day it is introduced, but by continuously seeing that concept and working on it through the year, a daily review allows students to experience success at their own pace.

So, how to incorporate a daily review into your schedule?

To be honest, you've just got to make the time. I know that for me, it seems like a constant struggle of trying to fit in all the things we have to do throughout the day, but I find a daily review important, so I fit it in the schedule.

The first thing to do to make it work is set up a routine at the beginning of the year. Whether you do a review as morning work, at the beginning of your math period, or at some other time of the day, if you get the students familiar with the routine, early on in the school year, you will save time throughout the rest of the year. I give out a few weeks of review at a time for students to keep in their books and then when they come into math class each day, they've already got the review and they know where we left off, so they can get started on it right away. Since I keep my reviews short and to the point, it really only takes up a few (15 max.) minutes of our class. The students work independently and then we quickly go over the questions and move on to the day's lesson. The review is a great way to get students settled and only takes up a small fraction of our class time.

If you're interested in trying out a daily review with your students, click the buttons below to head to the best packets for your grade level:

All the above grade levels have individual & bundle packs available. I am currently working on the fifth grade version and have individual packs available for Back to School, Fall & Winter. For those packs, click the picture below:

Do you use a daily review in the classroom? I would love to hear your opinions on the topic.

A Tale of Morning Work

Brace yourself, this may be a long one!

I was first introduced to the idea of morning work (though we didn't call it that) in my final practicum. We focused solely on math work and I thought it was great . . . for the most part. I thought the concept of having a little review time before the math lesson of the day was great, but my mentor teacher and I noticed some things that needed tweaking.

The first issue was the content. My mentor teacher found the most fitting book she could find at the time, and it worked . . . for the most part. Although we intended the morning work to be completed independently, we found that about half the time, the questions were covering topics the students hadn't seen or were not a part of the curriculum at all. This meant a lot of explaining on our part.

Another issue was the length. Each day was a full page with 10 questions. Here's what I found. A handful of students raced through the page. Another handful got about a third of the way through the page and the students who *really* needed the review, got overwhelmed and often only completed one or two questions.

The final thing that wasn't quite working out was that it didn't review the basics quite enough. This became apparent when, on a whim, my mentor teacher wanted to check the students' understanding of place value and number sense. So we started easy-ish. As an exit ticket, I gave the students 3 numbers in standard form, and asked them to represent them in written and expanded form. The results stopped us in our tracks. We were shocked by the results. A small handful of students could correctly answer the questions and some students were WAY off base. It definitely showed us where we needed to direct our teaching.

This was a real eye-opener for me. I've worked with a lot of students struggling in math and I've found that they are missing the basics. How can I expect them to be able to calculate the area of a rectangle, when they don't know their multiplication facts? How can I expect them to regroup, when they haven't mastered place value?

It was those questions that led me to create my Daily Math packs. I wanted something that could be used as morning work or homework, that not only covered grade levels topics, but also reviewed the basics. I felt it was important for it to spiral, starting with the previous year's curriculum before heading into the new grade level. I wanted something that was manageable for students who needed the review - I wanted them to feel successful.

So I created those . . . but that was two years ago. I felt the packs looked a bit dated, so I have finally started giving them a new look. I'm about halfway through my third grade set, and hope to move onto my fourth grade set next.

Was it the best idea to start this task at the beginning of a new school year? No, probably not, but now that I've started I am so excited can't wait to get all the packs finished!

Now I'm off to work on the Spring pack!

Getting Ready for Summer

Summer, ahhh that glorious word that is finally starting to be spoken around the school! Although I've still got 9 weeks (!) to go, I know some school districts are a little bit closer to that wonderful break, so I've started thinking about the end of the year already.

In addition to thinking about all the regular end of year things, my mind is also stuck on the job action taking place throughout my the province. We will see if that might mean a full-blown walkout.

But, let's forget about a little old thing like end of the year striking and focus on some more positive things, like prepping the students for next year!

That two month break can be looong for some students, especially struggling ones, so I've created some take-home booklets to send home with students over the break.

I have Daily Math versions for 1st-4th and they each have 40 days of math practice:

Each packet comes with instructions to create the mini-booklet:

I also have Word Problem a Day Booklets for 3rd & 4th. They also contain 40 days of word problems:

And finally, I've got a Daily Language Booklet for 1st grade:

What are you doing to prep for the end of the year? More importantly, how much longer do you have left?

Have a great week!

Spooktacular Solve It Freebie!

Well I was hoping to finish my new Halloween freebie today and I actually did - I kind of surprised myself. I must have been inspired as I was watching Dance Moms today. Seriously I cannot get enough of that show. Between that and Princesses Long Island, it was a great day for reality TV!

But onto the freebie. I love the fun that holidays bring into the classroom and wherever possible I like to make the curriculum fun by incorporating holiday themes.

My new freebie, Spooktacular Solve It contains 24 Spooky Number Task Cards. Each task card contains different instructions to find the spooky number. The task cards review place value, even & odd numbers, ordering numbers, least & greatest and has a little addition and subtraction thrown in.

Click {HERE} or the pictures to check it out - let me know if you enjoy!

Daily Math Update & Some Classroom Happenings

Yay - it's Saturday! Before I know it, it will be Monday again. So what did the week look like? We spent the week practicing our names with a bunch of fun activities. We did a name sort - unscrambling the letters in our names and then counting how many letters we each had in our name. The students then sorted our names into groups, according to how many letters, and completed a class graph.

I know of a few fun books for talking about names:

  

   

But, I'm always looking for more books to add to my library. Do you know of any other fun name books?

We also started talking about colours. For blue day, we made adorable (if I do say so myself) Pete the Cats, with each student choosing the colour for the shoes. We also added a little bit of writing - Pete loves his             shoes.

For yellow day, we made school buses and drew the bus driver and riders. Wouldn't you know? A few Petes showed up driving the buses (yes, we are apparently still Pete-obsessed!).

Some of our favourite colour books this week:

We'll continue colours next week and I would love to hear some more suggestions for colour books. A few more I still plan on using:

On a completely unrelated note, I have been swamped since school started but I did manage to finish the next packet in my Daily Math for first grade students:

Click on the pictures or {HERE} to check it out. I also updated my Daily Math First Grade Bundle to include this pack:

Click on the pictures or {HERE} to check it out.

Well now I'm off to enjoy the rest of the weekend!

You Know You're a Teacher When . . .

Fonts: Kimberly Geswein Fonts & kevinandamanda.com
Graphics: KPM Doodles & Graphics From the Pond

•  . . . you shush people . . . in public . . . without realizing it.
• a simple trip to the grocery store (in yoga pants) results in any number of shy waves, exuberant hellos, and quiet stares from past, present & future students.
• you spent 1% of the summer relaxing in the sun with a book and 99% organizing, stressing, creating & laminating.
• that book you were reading in the sun was a professional development book of some kind.
• in the book store, you head to the children's section first.
• school/office supplies of all kind are exciting.
• you know more than you ever wanted to know about Minecraft, Lalaloopsy & Beyblades.
• weeknights will always be referred to as "school nights."
• the last two weeks in August are the most exciting, nauseating, nerve-wracking & stressful time of the year.
• you will always experience the Back to School, even though you're no longer a student.

How you know when YOU are a teacher?

On a completely unrelated note, I've finished the next two Daily Math sets for First Grade, click the pictures if you're interested:

Each pack contains 40 days of printable math that works to review the Kindergarten Common Core Standards, while transitioning into the First Grade Common Core Standards.

Well, here's to two and a halfish more weeks of summer!

A Back to School Activity & a Freebie!

So I've been thinking about some fun back to school activities, so I thought I'd share one I saw online. I don't know about you but in my district, we get our old students back for a few days, while new classes are being sorted out, so we've got to have some activities to keep them busy, until they head off to their new classrooms.

It's always fun to have the students reflect/write/draw/share about their summer vacation.

via Kids Artists

I saw this picture from Kids Artists on Pinterest and it reminded me of an activity I did. Provide students with an outline of a pair of sunglasses and have them draw two events from their summer vacation. Put them up with a catchy slogan and you have a fun back to school bulletin board.

To go with this, I came up with a little writing activity. Have the students write a letter (to a friend, parent, teacher etc.) about their summer vacation. Click on any of the pictures below to download the free activity.

I've also finally finished my Back to School Daily Math for 1st Grade, click on the picture to check that out if you're interested.

This pack follows the same pattern as my other Daily Math units with each day consisting of 5 questions that review various Kindergarten Common Core Standards. Now off to work on the Fall set!

What's your go-to back to school activity? Leave me a comment below!