by MathPickle | Sep 11, 2015 |
My Pet Zebra (MathPickle, 2010) Introduce your elementary students to patterns, symmetry, order and chaos. Afterwards, you might look at the art below. If you were to arrange this art on a line from Chaotic (left) to Ordered (right) – where would each fall?...
by MathPickle | Sep 11, 2015 |
Name Connector (MathPickle, 2014) This icebreaker is great for any group to get to know one-another, but it is best suited to an elementary classroom learning about capital and small letters. The definition of a good mathematical problem is the mathematics it...
by MathPickle | Sep 11, 2015 |
No three in a line puzzle (Henry Dudeney, 1917) This is a great idea to get your students thinking about patterns. Watch the video above first. There are some changes that improve the experience: 1) I now start the class by getting them to solve the 3×3...
by MathPickle | Sep 2, 2015 |
Speed is essential, but some curricula value it too much. The core of every mathematics classroom should be problem solving. Ponderous problem solvers need to be protected. I am not making the case against memorizing basic facts. Students absolutely need to memorize...
by MathPickle | Aug 22, 2015 |
Perilous Pipes is an awesome puzzle with a beautiful set of manipulatives. For kindergarten and grade 1 students I show a solution and ask them to recreate it. This is a highly valuable activity akin to following lego instructions to build something, but a little bit...
