Saint Patrick's Day is a perfect time to bring theme learning into the classroom. Do you do any special learning activities in your classroom for St. Patrick's Day? Over the years, I have observed, taken part in, and actively planned many activities such as STEM Challenges (like Catching a Leprechaun), writing about their luckiest day, and having the entire class where the color green. This year I decided to create task cards for multiplying fractions and another set for dividing fractions with a St. Patrick's Day theme. I was planning on saving the task cards for St. Patrick's Day, but one of my students overheard me telling a colleague about them... and he interrupted our conversation by excitedly asking when we were going to play Scoot with them! My students LOVE Scoot!
If you have never played before I highly recommend you giving it a try. You need about 30-45 minutes to play with 24 cards. Give each student a paper to write down their answers and to also work out any problems. Place one task card on each desk. Then make sure students look to see which is their starting card. I typically have students circle the number on their answer sheet to help them remember where to start. Only one student starts on number 1! I give students about one minute to answer the card in front of them, Then I call out Scoot, and students move to the next desk. (***Actually... I call out "moo." That's their "go word" for many things. I love cows! So I actually say "moo." Not "scoot." So if you have a favorite animal or catch phrase, you can use that instead of saying the word "scoot."***) They have one minute to answer the next card, and then when time is up (or most students are finished) I call moo/scoot and they move to the next card. Play continues until students have answered all questions. Then you go over the answers.
I have several task card sets in my Teachers Pay Teachers store, and this year I have used most of them. Over half of my students this year are below grade level in math. So we started the year with 3rd grade math skills via the task cards. Students gained confidence because they didn't know the level, only that they were doing well! Throughout this school year I have gone back and forth between on level and below level for the games. My math mantra: review and reteach, differentiate, differentiate, differentiate!
Multiplying Fractions- Get them multiplying Fractions with this Luck of the Irish multiplying task cards set. There are 16 word problems, and 16 computation problems. Perfect for this time of year!
Dividing Fractions- I set up the perfect division word problems and computation problems in these cards. There are 16 word problems and 16 computation task cards in this resource. I know that it is perfect since these are the cards we used in Scoot today. Oh! Did I mention that I told the student that we would play today? It was perfect to use today as a review for the upcoming dividing fractions test! They love when they read each task card and see which student's name I used this time... hmmmm, you don't think that's why they like playing Scoot, do you? Well, whatever the reason, they enjoy playing. Playing Scoot means actively engaged learners! And most likely we will use them again in two weeks when it's St. Patrick's Day. Which of course goes right along with my math mantra: review and reteach, differentiate, differentiate, differentiate!
Happy Teaching!
Sandra @The Happy Learning Den
