MAPPING A WAY TO DECIMAL UNDERSTANDING

Using Cusinaire Rods and metric measurement students  worked collaboratively to make sense of meters, decimeters, and centimeters. They made metric measuring tapes and measured items in the classroom noticing patterns between meter, decimeter, and centimeter measurements. 

THE UNIT YOU

From Mindset Mathematics- Fifth graders explored the relationship between powers of 10 from 1/1000 to 1,000 by creating visual references beginning with student's height as a unit. Students presented their findings using objects and drawings. They continued with representing powers of 10 using small everyday objects and comparing the space take up by 10, 100, 1000 as well as 1/10, 1/100, 1/1000.  See more here.
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CAREER INTERVIEWS

The first fifth grade project of the 2018-2019 school year were Career Interviews. The students had the task of finding a family member or friend that has a job and was willing to be interviewed. The goal was to find out how they use math to do their job. They needed to investigate the kind of math concepts that they use daily. Interviews can be in the form of a magazine article, podcast, or video. We aligned these math concepts with the fifth grade curriculum we will be unpacking this year. 
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BOARD GAMES

"You have summer homework!" I hear the students screaming in unison "NO!" Honestly, I don't think they minded this activity! Some of these games are worthy of being sold at the local Target. 
Over the summer, students created a math game that reinforced topics that they learned in fourth grade. Games included topics such as multiplication, division, polygon identification, decimal fractions, and much more. We spent the first couple of days of school playing these games. Some have been added to weekly centers.