Timbits Math

This winter I  attended three Math sessions in Brandon put on by the Manitoba Rural Learning Consortium  (mRLC).  There I have had the chance to work with other Early Years teachers on  best practices for delivering the Math curriculum.  Thinking of the categories on the report cards for Mental Math/Estimation and Problem Solving, I felt I needed to learn more about planning and delivering effective lessons in these areas.
At the sessions, we were put into small groups and made a problem to try with our students.  For the final session on April 28, we came back to discuss what we found our classes could do and what to work on next.

 Here was the problem: 

The principal at our school would like to buy Timbits for two classes.  One class has 17 students and the other has 24.  Timbits come in boxes of 10.  How many boxes will he need to buy?

On Monday this week, I read the problem to the students and let them work on it.  I didn't give any other guidance to see what they could do independently.

 

  The Brandon session was on Tuesday and then on Wednesday, we worked on the same problem together as a class.  I listed the four answers that students in our room came up with and we worked through how they could have arrived at each answer and which was correct. Below are some samples of the students' work.

Overall, I was pleased with the results of  this problem and how they thought of ways to show their thinking.  It helps me plan for how to support the students who need extra practice and also to extend the learning for the ones who could solve this one successfully.

I brought Timbits back from Brandon too and everyone enjoyed the treat!  Our Timbits came in a box of  50.  If each of our 19 students ate two, how many were left to share with the staff in our building?  

They are also sold in boxes of 20.  What new problems could we create with that?