Summer savings for math teachers

Now is a great time to stock up on items for school.  In this past Sunday’s newspaper, Office Max has a brown paper bag where you can put items that you choose (read the small print because some items are not given a discount) to get a 15% discount.  This may not have occurred in all newspapers, but hopefully it did where you live.  Another place to buy items are thrift stores.  My school has implemented reading every day for twenty minutes.  I get my classroom reading books from thrift stores.  I am very careful about the ones that I choose, but they are very affordable.  If you have any great ideas about how to save on supplies, please leave a comment.

Time to think about next year!

Summer is here!!  My school ended last week.  As I look forward to the days of summer, I begin to wonder about next year.  Now is the time to reflect on what worked and what did not work.  This is the time to write your ideas down about how you want to start next school year off.  In my first week of school, I want to do more team building activities with the students.  They are also going to be given a basic skills pretest so that I can find out what they know and what they are lacking.  I can then work on those skills in small groups.  I am going to get substitute plans ready.  These will be based on basic skills and problem solving.  My goal is to be better prepared at the start of school than I was last school year. 

End of the year activities

Now that the end is near, here are some suggestions for what you can do with your students. 

1.  Play Jeopardy.  It works really well with a LCD projector and smartboard.

2.  Play math equation race on the chalkboard or whiteboard.  This is where the students are grouped in fours and each one takes a turn at the equation.  The first team to get the most correct is the winner.

3.  Play Uno.  The class can have several games going on at once.

4.  Play Math War with multiplication and division facts.  I got my cards from Barnes and Nobles.  The students really enjoy this game.

5.  Play bingo with basic math facts.  I purchased a bingo game from a Parent Teacher Store.  Let one of the students call out the cards. 

I hope you try some of these suggestions and let me know how things turn out.

Have a happy summer!