Merry Math Centers

It's about time, teachers, for some Merry Math Centers...

How Many Ways? -- Christmas Edition 

is an interactive bulletin board that can be used as a math center, an anchor activity, or a challenge for fast finishers. Similar to Boggle, the challenge in this fun, open-ended exercise is to reach a target number in as many different ways as possible. It provides instant differentiation by allowing the teacher to choose between 2 processes (counting or basic operations), as well as the choice of which and how many operations to use.  

This activity is CCSS aligned.  It requires students to think critically while practicing math skills.  It's a great way to keep your students engaged during this exciting time of year!

Scrattle: The Christmas Edition is a learning center that combines word work with computation; individual effort with competition. Using a set of letters, each student creates words. They then determine the value of their words using the Scrabble™ letter values. Then partners engage in a battle wherein they compare their word scores using >, <, and =. The winner is the student with the most >s.

SCRATTLE can be played by students with simple addition capabilities, as well as those skilled in solving mixed operations in complex equations. Three different recording sheets are included, providing instant differentiation. 

SCRATTLE is CCSS aligned.  This product contains 2 sets of letters; one set in color, one in black & white. It also includes 3 recording sheet templates.

Reindeer Squares are square arrays also known as Latin Squares. In mathematics, they are used for statistical analysis. If they seem familiar, they should; Sudoku is a 9 x 9 Latin Square.

Use Reindeer Squares to teach your students deductive reasoning and problem solving while disguising it as lots of fun. Begin by demonstrating how a 3 x 3 array works. Then up the ante with successively larger arrays. This is a great activity for differentiation. It also works well in centers or as a sponge activity. It is perfect for the fast finisher.

Coming soon ... centers for HOTS.

Literacy Centers to Light Up Your December!

Merry Monkeys is a literacy center focusing on antonyms. It is CCSS aligned for grades 4 and 5. However, I have used this center with advanced 1st graders!  So, really, any grade level could enjoy it.

The 48 cards challenge your students to find pairs of antonyms.  It can be a simple matching exercise, or you could have small groups play Go Fish with the cards.  Also included are labels for your file folder.


In Gingerbread Compounds, your students will mend the broken gingerbread cookies by finding the parts that make compound words.  There are 12 cookie tops, 12 cookie bottoms, 3 work mats, labels for your center folder, and 2 recording sheets.  

Despite the Santa hats on the cover, this center is holiday neutral. None of the graphics the children use have the holiday images, except on 1 form of the recording sheet. (The other form maintains the neutrality.) Thus, if you are doing a unit on gingerbread men, fairy tails, or plain old compound words, you can use this center at any time of the year. Gingerbread Compounds is CCSS aligned and best suited for grades 1 - 3.



I really love the gingerbread graphics from Pink Cat Studio, so I used them again for Contraction Cookies. In this CCSS aligned center, your students will match contractions with their component parts.  

This center is also holiday neutral. There are 3 cookie sheet work mats, 24 cards to make 12 contraction pairs, center labels, and a recording sheet.


Your students will determine how many syllables are in the holiday themed words in Friendly Frog's Syllable Sort. Included are 3 work mats, 18 picture/word cards, labels for your folder, and a black line recording sheet.


  

Check back soon for December math centers and critical thinking centers.

Math Centers You Will Want to Gobble Up!

Teachers, it's about time for some math centers especially created for this time of year.

Turkey Squares combines math and critical thinking skills as students try to fill arrays with different colored turkey icons without repeating a color in any row or column.  Also known as statistical arrays, you may recognize these as a mental exercise similar to Sudoku. Turkey Squares allows you to easily differentiate your instruction by providing successively more difficult arrays.

Turkey Fractions & Pumpkin Pie, Oh My! is, obviously, focused on fractions.  It consists of 28 cards to use with the game, "I Have..., Who Has...?"This center activity can also be used with the entire class. It is CCSS aligned.

Your students will practice addition and subtraction within 20 in Tail Feathers Math Center. After computing the value of each tail feather, students will place the feather on the turkey with that value. There are 4 full color work mats, 28 color tail feathers, labels for your center folder, and a black line recording sheet included in this product.  This activity is CCSS aligned.

While not exactly a math center, Pilgrim Square Puzzlers does exercise problem solving skills while disguising it as fun. The challenge with these puzzles is to reconstruct the square so that all of the images match on every interior side. 

There are 3 levels of difficulty included in this center, providing instant differentiation. These square puzzlers are also great for fast finishers. They won't be able to finish these quickly.

Pumpkinoes are holiday neutral, but perfect for this time of year. There are 8 games that can be used in all elementary classrooms to practice a variety of skills appropriate to the ages and stages of your students. Thus, differentiation is inherent. Skills in this unit include:

• Counting and cardinality
• Composing and decomposing numbers
• Addition, subtraction, and multiplication
• Even and odd numbers
• Greater than and less than
• Higher Order Thinking Skills

Included in this product are 45 Pumpkino cards in both color and black line. The number pairs on the Pumpkinoes range from (1, 1) to (9, 9). No blanks, or zeroes, are included. Also included are labels for your centers and directions for each of the 8 games. Recording sheets are provided for some activities. No answer keys are provided as all of the activities are open ended.

How Many Ways?  Fall Edition is an interactive bulletin board activity. The challenge in this activity is to arrive at a given number in many different ways. 

It readily provides differentiation by allowing the teacher to choose between 2 questions: one asks students to count to the target number; one requires students to use basic operations to arrive at the target. It may be easily adapted to any elementary grade level and provides differentiation within a single grade.



Turkey time is upon us!  It's time to stuff your centers.

I would love it if you would follow and contribute to my Pinterest boards:

Literacy Centers for Turkey Time

It's about time, teachers, for some literacy centers especially created for this time of year.

Your students will love working on vocabulary, parts of speech, synonyms, rimes, making inferences, and interpreting data while having fun with Thanksgiving Hink Pinks, Hinky Pinkies, and Hinkity Pinkities.  

If you are not familiar with Hink Pinks, et al., you are in for a treat.  Hink Pinks are riddles wherein the clues lead you to a 2 word answer. Each answer word must have just one syllable and the 2 words must rhyme. Hinky Pinkies are 2 word rhymes with 2 syllables in each word. Hinkity Pinkities are rhyming word pairs with 3 syllables each.  For example:

The answer to this riddle is raise maize.  

This product includes 20 cards with Thanksgiving themed clues and, naturally, an answer sheet. Copy the cards on cardstock (pink, of course), then laminate them for years of use. I recommend solving several clues together to ensure your students’ success. This activity is CCSS aligned.

Turkey Drumsticks uses Thanksgiving vocabulary to practice constructing compound words. Students search for two drumsticks that form a compound word when joined together. They place the pairs on plates until they have found all 9 compound words. 

A recording sheet is included. The recording sheet requires students to write the compound words they found and apply them to the context of the sentences.

Turkey Tails requires students to focus on the long and short vowel sounds of a & e. 

After determining the vowel sound of the word on each tail feather, they will place the feather on the turkey with that vowel symbol. The words used are taken from the first 200 words on the Fry lists. 

This center contains 4 full color work mats, 28 full color feathers, labels for your center folder, and a black & white recording sheet.

Let's Talk Turkey Words exercises your students' abilities to be fluent and flexible in thought and oral language. It will also inform you about your students' command of common spelling patterns and sight words.  

Give each student the letters for one of the 4 seasonal words. Challenge them to create as many words as they can using that set of letters. A recording sheet is included.  This center is CCSS aligned and it's FREE!

Scrattle: Thanksgiving Edition is a learning center that combines word work with computation; individual effort with competition. As in Scrabble™, students use a set of letters to create words. 

After recording their words, they calculate each word’s score using the Scrabble™ letter values. Then they engage a friend in a battle wherein they compare their scores using >, <, and =. 

The student with the most > wins the battle! BTW, Scrattle derives it names from SCRAbble + baTTLE. 

SCRATTLE can be played by students with simple addition capabilities, multiplication abilities, as well as those skilled in solving mixed operations in complex equations. Three different recording sheets are included, providing instant differentiation. This center is also FREE!

It's about turkey time, teachers!  Fill your centers with turkey goodness.

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