It's Five for Friday on a Saturday!! :) Time to link up with Kacey from Doodle Bugs Teaching. :) This week we finally got to teaching GCF/LCM within word problems. The students theoretically learned GCF/LCM in 4th grade, but applying it to word problems was a challenge. We started off by reviewing LCM/GCF. I shared with the students how I DISLIKE factor rainbows. In my opinion they are not as easy to use as a table, so that is why I taught them to make a table if the numbers are smaller. However, for the larger numbers I would like them to use prime factorization to help them: I also made a LCM anchor chart, but I made a mistake on it, and had to scribble it out, so it wasn't picture-worthy. :) We then played Showdown with my GCF/ LCM word problems for older students. They had to identify whether the problem was a LCM problem or a GCF one. This was really good practice, because it is a hard concept for them to pick up on. You can find my GCF/LCM task cards HERE. I also created this to reinforce what we were doing for my fall line-up in my classroom: On Friday my teammate and I as part of our Fun Friday Enrichment time for the students who have not struck out with our behavior system got to participate in the Save Fred Challenge!!! I found a great resource on TPT from Smart Chick Teaching Resources. It was great! I gave my homeroom either a diamond or club suited card, and my partner gave his homeroom a heart or spade. We then split the kids up. I sent all the black suited cards to his room, and he sent all of the red suited cards to my room. The students then partnered with the student who had the matching number and color of the other ones card. It was a GREAT way to have the students mix and mingle! :) If you have never done this activity before--it's GREAT!!!!! They had a ball! This week over on Facebook, my fellow NC teachers and I are participating in a blog hop!! There is something for ALL grade levels to be had!! FOR FREE!!! Here are all of the starting points for each grade level: PK-2 https://www.facebook.com/MyKindergardenBlooms 3-5 https://www.facebook.com/mrelementarymath?ref=bookmarks 6-8 https://www.facebook.com/NorthCarolinaHistoryGal My freebie is a great one for older students to practice reflecting points over the y-axis to create a picture! Snag it on my FB page and be sure to check out all of the other freebies available!!! :) Also, in the spirit of fall and Halloween, this week I will be participating in a Halloween themed giveaway contest with The Teaching 2 Step: I will be giving away this product: The contest starts next week, so be sure to head on over for your chance to win!! :) This week as a whole again was great. I am still very much enjoying my decision to be in middle school...LOVE IT actually. :) At the end of October we are having a "Scare the Bear" costume/dance party during the school day. My teaching partner and I want to dress up as something that goes together, but we are struggling with an idea, so if any of you all have an idea out there, let me know, please!!! :)