When finished, we underlined the shortest and circled the longest object. We then had to explain how we knew which object was the longest and shortest. During the I Do and We Do parts of the lessons during the week, we had worked on writing 3 sentences to explain how we worked it out:
First sentence: Say what you did and what you measured with.
Second sentence: Say what the measurements are.
Third sentence: Say which object was longest.
This helped most kids get past the "I looked at it and just knew" explanation!
This week we only did one rotation over four days using my T.I.M.E. rotations.
For T: Teacher's Choice we rolled cars labelled A-F down a ramp (made from a Really Good Stuff portable desktop pocket chart propped on a tub!) and measured the length each car travelled. I have groups of 6 so 3 students sat on each side of the ramp. One measured the length with unifix cubes by laying out trains of ten and then extra ones (great counting practice!) and the other side measured with paddle pock sticks. After 3 cars, they swapped what they measured with. Because this was the first week back after our Winter break, I had mixed ability groupings and did the same activity with all the groups. Most of the time, I do homogenous groups and tailor the Teacher's Choice center to what each group needs.
For I: Independent Work, I put out a tub of classroom objects that each student estimated the length of in unifix cubes and then measured. When we reviewed estimating whole class, I had to reiterate that the estimate didn't have to be perfect, it just had to be sensible! Earlier, I had students wanting to change their estimate to make it the ACTUAL measurement. This saying, which they could finish saying for me (!) really made them think and write down a sensible estimate.
For M: Math Facts I put out some review games from Lory Evans and Donna Boucher. The links take you to their TpT stores. I always put in a 100 chart and flash cards. The 100 chart they use for working out equations they don't know.
For E: Essential Review (which I call Easy Review with my firsties this year) we reviewed 3D shapes. I love this tub because we get to review topics that may not show up again in our math units for a little while. Sometimes I put in activities that we did during whole class lessons a few weeks earlier for independent practice or I put in new activities that covers concepts that I want them to reinforce (like this week with Natalie Lamont's C3PO's 3D shapes booklet).
You can pick up just the four sheets that I made this week on Google Drive by clicking here and here. Visit the TpT links above to grab the other great centers.
You can read more about my T.I.M.E Math set-up here and here.
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