Planning the first day of school can be stressful! Learn my 3 favorite activities that will allow you to have the perfect first day of middle school math!
Show your middle school math students the relevance of what they are learning with this fun bulletin board kit that answers the age-old question "When are we ever going to use this?" This bulletin board includes the letters to spell out "When are we ever going to use this?" and includes 15 cards that each feature a middle school math topic and 4 unique jobs that use that math skill. The topics included in this set are: decimals, fractions, integers, percents, ratios & proportions, angles, area & volume, transformations, equations, exponents, slope & linear functions, data analysis, probability, measurement, and problem solving. (Please see the preview for a look at all of the included cards!) Included in the zip folder that you download are both a printable pdf and an svg file. The pdf is for traditional printing and cutting by hand on 8.5 x 11 paper, while the svg can be used with your cutting machine to save you time and energy!! This is a great bulletin board for the secondary math classroom to remind your students of the importance of math! Check out more middle school math classroom decor here!
I started putting together these math joke of the week posters at the end of last school year. I'm super excited about how it turned out. I put the finishing
I love finding first day of school math activities! These back to school activities are perfect for middle school or high school math.
Invisible Math is the best math classroom poster for 6th, 7th, or 8th grade math. If you are looking for math bulletin board ideas for back to school 2021, you have found what you are looking for!
I develop curriculum for middle school math. I focus on using critical-thinking skills in my content so the math makes sense to the students.
There are so many ways to use math task cards in upper elementary and middle school. This game uses math task cards with a bit of a twist!
As a teacher, there is so much to do when it comes to setting up the classroom, that it is hard to know where to start! Over the course of my first six years of teaching middle school math, a few of these classroom projects have become staples in my classroom. In this post, I plan to share a few of these ideas. (1) Assignment Notebook Board The first thing my middle school students do (or should be doing!) when they come to class is fill out their assignment notebooks. With some ruler tape that I found at Office Max, I created this assignment notebook board. The number 1 on each day is for what we do in class. The number 2 on each day is any homework that is assigned. For example the 1 might be "Multiply Fractions" and the 2 might be "Pg 232 hw (due tmw)." (2) Math is Everywhere Board I have written about this project in a few other posts, but it is one of my all time favorites to start the year! I have two bulletin boards in my classroom. This one gets filled with these tiles. Students must show how they see math in the real world on their tile. On the back of their tile, they must write a paragraph explaining how math is seen in the topic that they chose! You can click HERE for a free set of the bulletin board letters! (3) Challenge of the Week Many of you have already seen or tried out the Challenge of the Week in your classroom! I have loved seeing the pictures! Each week, I put up a new challenge problem. They are optional and students have until the end of the day on Thursday to turn it in. Anyone who gets it correct gets a small prize on Friday when we go over the answer! Both the 6th Grade Challenge of the Week Problems and the 8th Grade Challenge of the Week Problems are FREE in my TpT store. Enjoy! (4) Teacher Book Shelf My teacher book shelf took on some major changes recently. I started with this new way of organizing all of my math workshop materials. I decided to organize them more by the type of game, rather than by the topic like I had done in the past. I cleared these shelves off and organized them in these containers that I had ordered a few years ago. If you are looking for the materials and resources that I use for math workshop, be sure to check out my Math Mega Bundle (Upper Elementary/Middle School) and my Math Mega Bundle (8th Grade Math). Below these containers, I have two shelves with labels for Monday through Friday. This is where I put all of my plans and resources that I will be using for the coming week. This has been a useful way to stay organized and prepared throughout the week! As you can see, I am not quite ready for the first week of school... On the bottom of these shelves are my task cards, which very well could be the hardest resource when it comes to organization! I found these containers at Michaels. They have worked out pretty well. I have two sets of task cards that I use throughout each school year for each grade level. I have a regular set of task cards and then a set of enrichment task cards. Each set takes up two of these containers. Teaching two different grades means I end up with 8 of these containers, which is pretty manageable! Check out the links below if you are interested in the task cards for each grade level! 6th Grade Math Task Cards Bundle 6th Grade Math Enrichment Task Cards Bundle 7th Grade Math Task Cards Bundle 7th Grade Math Enrichment Task Cards Bundle 8th Grade Math Task Cards Bundle 8th Grade Math Enrichment Task Cards Bundle (5) Bulletin Board (Number 2) My second bulletin board is filled with some routine-oriented and expectation posters. I made these the last few years. The colored math workshop poster shows where students of each group should be at any given time. The homework data chart is where we record our homework data. As a class, we figure out what percentage of homework we turn in on time each day. Over the course of the year, we graph these and look at trends. It also becomes a fun competition between classes! (6) Bobblehead Collection I started my bobblehead collection a while ago and it has just grown ever since! Students enjoy seeing them and it is a fun way for students to get to know me and my interest in baseball! My wife and I are trying to get to all 30 MLB stadiums, and recently made it to Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City. Luckily it was a bobblehead giveaway, so the Kevin Appier Royals bobblehead is the most recent addition to the collection!
Looking for a list of the 10 best math movies ever made? This collection of movies with math as a central theme celebrates math in the movies and is appropriate for all ages. The list includes excellent movies about math, examples of math in the movies, and suggested math movies for middle school st
I develop curriculum for middle school math. I focus on using critical-thinking skills in my content so the math makes sense to the students.
If you are looking to add some fun math review to your middle school classroom, math games are the perfect fit. These versatile activities can be used in small math groups, math centers, math workshop, as review math games, or as a teacher vs. class game. Since I have spent so much time creating gam
Item description “Find Someone Who…” is a great activity for the first day of school in middle school math class! Students will walk around the room and find other students to fill in their nine squares. Two versions are included in this set: one with nine math problems and one with nine personal questions with follow up questions – for example, “Find someone who has a dog” and “What is the dog’s name?”
Real life math lessons are key to helping students see the connections between in class lessons and real life.
Looking for some fun middle school activities to incorporate in your math lessons? Trying to come up with fun ideas that fit your curriculum? Here are 20 great activities and project ideas! There are three main themes to the activities listed below: real life, food (perfect for those hungry pre-teens!), and creativity. The instructions for all activities can be easily modified for students in Grade 6, Grade 7, and Grade 8. If your child is home-schooled, or you are just looking for additional home learning tasks, then these activities are perfect for you! All of the materials can easily be found in your home.
I develop curriculum for middle school math. I focus on using critical-thinking skills in my content so the math makes sense to the students.
Too many classroom icebreakers require students to take big social risks with people they barely know. Or they don't really help students get to know each other. Or they are just plain cheesy.
Use this fantastic pentomino exploration as a first day of math class activity in middle school. You'll learn so much about your students!
Engage your math students right from the start! In this post, I share five engaging lesson hooks for math, including resource links to get started.
Use this ratios and proportions activity to help middle school math students see the application of ratio and proportion concepts.
Ready to make math centers work in shorter middle school class periods? Get the details - structure, scheduling, activities, and more!
Analyzing writing curriculums, planning writing workshop and teaching writing lessons can be overwhelming. You might think, how am I going to fit everything in and produce successful writers? Where do I start? What skills do they need? This post will share the 7 BASIC WRITING LESSONS that every teacher should teach! With this basic knowledge, students will be able to perform other writing assignments more effectively. The following skills are not only effective in upper elementary, they are often needed at the middle school level for review or the primary level for differentiation. So yes, every teacher should teach them! If you start with these 7 fundamental skills, it will set the expectations for your writing lessons and assignments throughout the year! Frequently Asked Questions What are the basic skills and what order should I teach them? Sentence Structure 1. Complete Sentences Lesson for complete sentences 2. Fragments Lesson for fragments 3. Run-ons Lesson for run-ons Paragraph Writing 4. Topic Sentences Lesson for topic sentences 5. Relevant Details Lesson for relevant details 6. Transition Words Lesson for transition words 7. Closing Sentences Lesson for closing sentences How much time should I dedicate to teaching these fundamental skills? I recommend one day for each skill. If you spend a whole writing block for each skill, students will benefit from the practice. How do I teach each skill? First: Start with an anchor chart explaining the skill. (See each lesson link above for effective anchor charts.) Second: Provide examples. Students can share examples too! Next: Students should take notes. I love using Interactive Writing Notebooks to take notes. Research supports the use of interactive notebooks through studies on multiple intelligences, the brain and note taking. Here are a few videos to Set Up Interactive Writing Notebooks. Click photo for the Upper Elementary Version. A Primary Version is also available. Then: Identify the skill. Provide practice sheets and task cards for students to practice identifying the skill in sentences and paragraphs. Last: Apply the skill. Students should have the opportunity to write their own sentence or paragraph to apply the particular skill. What if I can't fit the lesson in one writing block? If you can't extend the days to complete them, there are other ways to get the whole lesson in. You can put practice sheets or task cards in a center, or you can have students apply the skill for homework or morning work the next day. What if my students, some of my students, or absent students can't do interactive notebooks? Make a small anchor chart to put in their notebooks with the same information! If you don't have a printable poster, take a picture of the anchor chart you used in class and print them off! I hope you found this post helpful and your students become successful writers this year! Connect With Me! TPT Store Facebook Pinterest My Blog
This post explains how teachers can use an academic version of the highly engaging Spoons game to review concepts. Free games included!
9 valuable lessons I've learned about Classroom Management as a middle school teacher!
Collaboration is great, isn’t it?! It brings students together and not only enhances their learning, it builds those critical social skills students are in desperate need of. Here are my 5 favorite strategies I use in my middle school classroom to encourage collaboration. They are step by step, ea
Prepare for a great year!
Looking for strategies to help make math class more efficient and therefore have a more effective math class for your middle schoolers?
My rule #1 in a series about bringing out the best behavior in middle school students, Helpful tips for managing adolescents effectively.
Ready to make math centers work in shorter middle school class periods? Get the details - structure, scheduling, activities, and more!
Some days you just need a break from the monotony! Preparing for exams, transitioning to a new unit, days when half your students are gone for a basketball tour
The moment students step foot in a classroom they get an idea of what that class is all about. Let’s try to get them excited about math with some meaningful classroom decorations. I’ve gathered some ideas for bulletin boards, signs, and useful decorations that are perfect for middle and high school
I develop curriculum for middle school math. I focus on using critical-thinking skills in my content so the math makes sense to the students.
If you're looking for a way to make your homeschool math lessons more engaging, add math games to your day. Games help middle school students learn in a fun and exciting way.
This is the fifth installment in the Everything You Ever Wanted To Know about Using Exit Tickets in your Math Classroom blogging series. If you haven’t already, check out the first four posts and t…
This editable resource syllabi bundle includes 11 different syllabus templates and 26 different meet the teacher to use in your upper elementary, middle school, or high school classroom. Create eye-catching, visually appealing syllabi that your students will actually read. This resource is editable in PowerPoint. These templates WILL NOT work on Chromebooks and/or Google. THE DIGITAL GOOGLE VERSION IS FINALLY HERE. CLICK HERE! Please read all disclaimers before purchasing. Familiarity with PowerPoint, downloading fonts, and using PowerPoint templates/text boxes is HIGHLY recommended. PLEASE NOTE: You will need the following FREE fonts to use this resource {there is also a directions page to send you to these fonts as well}. KG Blank Space Solid KG The Fighter KG A Little Swag Bromello Better Together
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