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Calendar Coast & Freebie
I’ve been at school nonstop getting my classroom ready for my new first graders next Tuesday. I’m physically exhausted from all of the prep work that goes into a new school year and classroom, but I’m also excited and eager to meet my students and start working with them.
Like every teacher, I change things up each year. This year, I was determined to extend my math instruction by almost 30 minutes – increasing from 60 minutes last year to almost 90 minutes this year. (Okay..85 minutes. I didn’t think taking away a restroom break after lunch would sit well with my parents.) If you know me, you know I love research. Especially educational research. We already know that the more time children spend reading, the better readers they become. Well, guess what? The more time kids spend doing math – the better they become at it. Crazy, huh? I know. You didn’t see that one coming.
85 minutes of math means unlike last year, I have plenty of time for a daily math meeting in addition to my mini-lessons and guided math groups.
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I feel strongly about the importance of doing a math meeting with my firsties every day to constantly review and learn new math concepts throughout the year. Many of my first graders gained a great understanding of number sense through our daily math meeting. We count, skip-count, learn shapes, tell time, count money, study place value, write equations, review even and odd numbers, and much more!
When I taught first grade a few years ago, some of my squirmy ones had a hard time focusing during our math meeting. This year I came up with what I’m hoping will keep them engaged and on-task. There are tons of these out there online but I came up with one that looks similar to my meeting board. I laminated one for each child (front and back) and placed the laminated page in a sheet protector. Inside the sheet protector is a piece of felt for an eraser. Students will follow along with me each day on their math mat using a dry erase marker at the carpet. (Right now, the hundreds chart goes up to 100 but after this is mastered we will move on to 120.)
Grab your *free* copy by clicking {HERE} and downloading it from Google Docs. Or, click the pictures below.
I’m off to assemble Writer’s Workshop folders. Enjoy!! 🙂
Happy Learning,
Thank you for sharing…I need a plan for calendar math. Last year I had a calendar and that was about it. And at the end of the year the students had to write the months in order on a test (um…not like we had studied it formally in that math program, either) and there were some who were not even close!
I've got to ask… What did you "give up" to add 25 minutes of math instruction?
Love the calendar mats. Will you complete all of it every day?
Hi Amy! That is a great question. I realized from last year that I was still placing grammar as a separate "subject" in my plans and it's not. It is part of reading, writing, and speaking. So I will now integrate it into my writing block mini lessons. I am also overlapping writing and Daily 5. Something I kept separately last year as well. 🙂 Integration is key 🙂
Thanks for the response. It always seems like there is never enough time to do everything we want to do!
This is such a clever idea! Thank you for sharing 🙂