When emphasis is placed on grading, children become more concerned with achieving the grade than on the journey in achieving the grade, sometimes associating their “goodness” then, with the grade. An achiever-style A/B student can show achievement and success, though more often than not, it can be detrimental to the student’s self-esteem.  The child’s struggle and focus can become a goal for the teacher’s acceptance, literally surpassing the learning aspect altogether.

Pedagogue, Alfie Kohn calls this “chasing the carrot” or “avoiding the stick” in his text What Does it Mean to be Well Educated? (2004).  Kohn suggests that rewarding students for a certain grade can be as damaging as punishing for not having done so.  Both methods skip over the central core of a student – the natural joy and thirst for learning.  This natural thirst and joy for learning is present in children, so obviously in the early years.  Though once introduced to the system of grading, the child can subconsciously develop strategizing – a subtle form of innocent manipulation to work at receiving that age-old important authority / parental / teacher’s acceptance.

Focusing on the importance of grades can breed memorizer students – those who practice memory techniques to give back to a teacher what the student thinks the teacher wants, rather than the optimal learner students.  Even though memorizing can be an effective study tool, memorizing is not likely the quality learning result that a teacher truly wants for the student.

Where grading may be an important part of the educational system, it is only effective if minimal importance of it is placed upon the psyche of the child.  Introducing games in the curriculum of a child’s schooling reminds the child that learning is by its very own nature, supposed to be fun.  Designing curriculum that regularly incorporates left-brain/right-brain activities such as spatial functioning card games, both encourages the child to desire learning again (what was once a natural thing), and while literally developing new healthy dendrites in the child’s growing brain.

For an example on Teaching Through Inspiration, here are some of our Fun Math Learning Games:

http://www.math-lessons.ca/activities/Geometry.html

http://www.math-lessons.ca/activities/OneEquals.html

http://www.math-lessons.ca/activities/equiv-fractions-bingo.htm

Did you know that most people in general tend to do better with any activity when they are competing against someone else? One great way to accomplish this is to incorporate a technique through a fun and stimulating school activity.  The way that this game works is that each student is given different times-tables problems.

Each problem is given a certain point amount. For each correctly solved problem that the student has correct, they are assigned the amount of points associated with that problem.  For example, 1×1=1, they would be given 1 point; 2X2=4, and so on. If the student answers the problem incorrectly, they do not gain any points.  As a matter of fact, they lose the amount of points that correspond to the problem they answered incorrectly. This technique gets the children even more interested in learning multiplication tables as well as answering the problems correctly. It will also get them motivated to correctly answer the equations, especially those with the higher numbers so they can accumulate more points.

At the end of the assignment each student’s score is added up and the person with the most correct problems, as well as the most points is designated as the winner. If there is more then one winner, then you can do a sudden death match and have each player compete against each other until there is a winner. Or you can reward both of them with the title of “Multiplication Masters” and they can be the designated team leaders when you play this game another time.

You can also add even more fun to this game by breaking the class up into teams and assigning 5 players to each team. This allows the students a chance to interact with each other and learn the value of teamwork, plus for those students that are struggling they will be able to work with other students that can help them out.

By incorporating this fun game into your teaching plan, learning multiplication tables will be a lot more fun for kids, plus they will benefit from working with other students. They will also learn a valuable lesson that integrates the concepts of intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.

Steps:

1. Take a sheet of fractions that you may have on hand that are just plain old fraction problems.
2. Let’s say that the first fraction of the first problem on the sheet is ¼
3. Let’s use that good ol’ imagination of yours and let’s write out that problem so the kids will enjoy reading the problem and learn something important at the same time.  Therefore, you would write something to this extent:

Tommy has four toy trucks. Of these four toy trucks, one is green. How many trucks does Tommy have that are green? Write this in a fraction. Answer- ¼

1. Now for the same problem, but the second number, let’s say it’s also ¼

You would write:

Jerry has four cookies.  Of those four cookies, one is chocolate chip. Write this in fraction form. Answer- ¼

1. Now you instruct them on the paper to take the first two you wrote out and have them make a fraction problem, therefore it would be ¼+¼ =

You can do this with as many problems as you would like. It would also be great to work in some topics that kids are interested in like snacks or candy or something fun.

By incorporating this technique, the students might be able to catch on a little better. They will also be able to grasp the beginning concepts of logic and probability, which they will need to be able to understand later in school.

….And of course, our other Fun Fractions Game for decimals, percentiles and money:

http://www.math-lessons.ca/activities/OneEquals.html

Everyone loves those cute complimentary crispy cookies when enjoying some delightful Asian cuisine. These cookies are not only uniquely aerodynamic, but they have a nice little message inside that is inspirational and uplifting. So why not combine this same concept to your teaching lesson by having your students learn more about fractions by making their own fortune cookies. Throughout the entire process of making these fortune cookies you will also be instructing the class on how to fold the paper which incorporates fractions. This technique will keep them busy, more interested in learning fractions, as well as give them a chance to express their creativity.

Materials:

- Plain white paper, paper color of choice, or color construction paper.

- Markers, crayons or color pencils.

Building Steps:

1) Begin with a piece of paper that is square in shape.

2) You can decorate one side if you would like to give it more color.

3) Fold the paper in half so it now forms a rectangle.

4) Unfold it, rotate it, and fold the paper at a right angle from the original fold, but in the direction of the identical side of the paper. Unfold it. Now the square has a vertical and a horizontal crease in the middle.

5) Flip the paper over so the decorated side is facing downward.

6) Take each corner of the square and fold it so it touches the middle point in the center.

7) Flip it over. (Notice that it is twice as thick as before.)

8) Fold the four new points so they meet in the center.

9) The end-result is a small thick square. Fold it again so it is a rectangle shape, and then fold it once more so that it is a square once again. Unfold the last two folds; all you need are the creases.

10) Extend the flaps with the less tighter points away from the body. This is so you can fit your index finger and thumbs underneath these flaps.

11) Now with your fingers below the flaps, condense the four outer corners together so you have a shape that resembles that of a flower. The middle part of the flower is now the bottom point.

12) Now for the creative part! Instruct your students to write different types of fraction problems on each of the sides on the outer part of the cookie. They can also draw pictures and jokes along with these fractions to make it more interesting. For instance, if you are instructing the students to create the fraction that is _ + _ = 1 whole, they can draw a heart that is split down the center and is composed of two parts. The inside part of the cookie will reveal the concealed answers to the fraction problems.

By incorporating this crafty project, students will be engaged, learn more about fractions as well as be able to interact with other students and solve each others riddles. What could be more fun then having the students participate in classroom activities as well as learn something new in the process?

Materials Needed:

One egg carton with 12 slots

Black Marker (Sharpie)

2 different colored medium sized rounded beads

How to design the egg carton:

Take the egg carton and using a black marker, write numbers inside each of the bottom of the slots where the eggs were. There should be 12 slots. Take the beads and place them inside the carton.

Game Instructions:

Have the students stand in a circle. Start the game off by handing one of the students the egg carton with the beads inside. Instruct the students how the game is played (by shaking the egg carton and then opening it up to see where the beads have landed). The students will then multiply the two numbers where the beads have fallen.

Each student who answers correctly is allowed to stay in the game and continue to play. If the student answers the problem incorrectly, they are taken out of the game. The game continues until there are no more remaining players.

Tips:

You can keep track of who answers the most answers correct and give them a special privilege, such as being the head facilitator of the game the next time you decide to play.

To make this game more challenging you can time each person so they are limited on the amount of time they have to come up with the answer. Also, if they cannot come up with the answer within the specific amount of time then they are also taken out of the game.

Teachers can also have the students make their own personalized carton if they see that the students are interested in the game. This way the student can practice this game at home to help them learn the multiplication tables.

Instead of using black markers, you can decorate the egg carton with cute stickers and other adhesive embellishments to make it even more attractive to the students.

“The essence of mathematics is not to make simple things complicated, but to make complicated things simple.” S. Gudder

Someone asked me once: “Why do you pay so much importance to math? Is that any good for you? Why do you like it? “. And I said: “what do I win with math? Everything… J

Math changes the way I think and my approach to life. It helps me to get better organized and see things in better perspective. It makes a major contribution to my personal development and to my cognitive transformation.

Math develops reasoning and reasoning helps in just about everything. To understand math means to understand its principles and to apply them in the very daily life. Math is not just calculus and drawing pictures, math is more than that – it is learning to approach a situation, to find the optimum solutions for it and to search for and delete any possible cases in its way.

Math is about forming a strong character. When you face a difficult situation and must find a quick solution, math and reasoning skills give a fast and analytical perspective of the situation, putting you in the position of choosing the best option in a rational way. And in that moment, you grow up more.

First time when you hear about math, you can’ t see it from this perspective, all you see is numbers and strange signs. But if you keep learning and discovering, you will find that honestly, math has it own beauty. ;)

Guest Post by Octavian Ghergheli – http://www.octavianghergheli.ro

Simple doesn’t have to mean 1, 2, 3 – it really means that it makes sense to the pupils because if it doesn’t make sense it will be difficult for them to grasp what you are trying to tell them. Even if they eventually do what you need them to do but don’t understand the concept and the “how” of what you are telling them, it will probably be lost the minute they have passed the test and you move on to something else. Practice helps tremendously – making them do fractions or decimals themselves and letting them practice will usually eventually make sense and they will learn to do it because they can illustrate it themselves if called upon to do so.

The goal of a teacher is often to complete a textbook by the end of a school year or a semester but if the student does not “get it” and you go on to the next chapter without them grasping the concept they will suffer their entire lives because they won’t be able to figure out a tip at a restaurant or make sense of budgeting or doing their taxes. So a teacher’s goal should be to ensure that your students understand fully what they need to know in the “real world” rather than what is found in a textbook.

You as the teacher are in charge so you can determine the order in which you teach and the tools you use to teach them – whether it is with graphics on a white board or other means. Visuals will always make more sense because you can see the why and how in front of you.

4 Whole Numbers & Fractions Card Games (Grades 4-6)

3 Geometry Games (Grades 1-3)

3 Fractions, Decimals & Percent Games (Grades 2-4

Too often teachers get caught up in the day to day activities of teaching math and sometimes become like automatons doing things the same way day after day and year after year. When you find that you don’t deviate from the textbook or from the same tired examples you have used over and over – you will begin to place too much emphasis on the mundane rather than the joy that can be derived from teaching others mathematics with enthusiasm.

What do we mean by enthusiasm? Well – it has a lot to do with presentation. Make your classes fun with games and competitions so that the children will be excited about learning because it will be a creative endeavor that makes them work to excel rather than just read a textbook and answer a few questions. Try using puzzles or other ways to make learning math more interesting for your pupils.

Explain how children will use the math you are teaching in their everyday lives. If children don’t have a foundation of basic addition and subtraction and multiplication, they will flounder with fractions and decimals and more difficult lessons later on. Work together or in teams to teach the various types of math. Try to use examples that will be found readily in their homes so that they can understand more readily and don’t let those big thick textbooks rule your classroom.

Venture out into other types of teaching that uses drawings or pictures or software programs if those are available. The more adventurous and enthusiastic you are about your subject matter, the more easily the children will respond positively and learn much more readily. Ask your children to provide examples in real life so that they can share and discuss percentages and decimals or whatever topic comes up making it more real – and more fun for all.