100 Days! Hooray!

We celebrated our 100th day of school a few weeks back but I haven't had time to post about it yet. So, here goes! We started our day by having the students write one sentence about what age they currently are and what they are like now. For example, they wrote things like "I am age 6 and I am a good student." Then then wrote another sentence pretending to be 100 years old. They wrote past tense sentences listing off some of their future accomplishments such as "I am 100 years old and I have been a doctor and a father to four children." We talk a great deal in our class about the importance of going to college so I used this lesson to reinforce the concept that you can be anything you want to be as long as you work hard. It was neat to see where the students hope to be when they are 100. They then drew pictures of themselves at these ages. Unfortunately, I did not remember to take pictures of these before I sent them home. :(

For math, we read 100 Day Worries by Margery Cuyler. Just like in the book, the students were asked to bring in a bag of 100 small items. They brought in pencils, pennies, beans, cereal, pins, etc. The students sat in a large circle and created sets of tens out of their items. The students then took a gallery walk around the circle counting the items by tens. We had a discussion about how some of the groups looked larger and some looked smaller but they all had 100 items. It was a great way for students to understand that the size of the objects did not change the quantity.

Partitioning Numbers

To help your students build quick number recognition using ten rods and ones, have them play Partioning Numbers. The game flashes various numbers and gives three answer options. As soon as the students choose the correct number, it moves to another. You can also download a set of Place Value Flashcards that I made for FREE.

Base Ten Block Game

To help your child with place value, have them visit Learning Box to play the Base Ten game. The students will build various numbers. We are currently working on building numbers to 50. You can also have your child practice at home with manipulatives you probably have around the house. You can use pretzel sticks, craft sticks, straws, toothpicks, pencils, etc. for tens. You can use marshmallows, candy, buttons, etc. for ones. A trick we use in class to signal when it is time to break a skip counting pattern between tens and ones is to clap in between the units. For example, if we are counting to 32, the students would say 10-20-30-(clap)-31-32.

Place Value Initials

***UPDATE: You can now download the templates on my TPT store.***

To practice place value, the students built the first letter of their name with paper Base Ten Blocks. They then counted how many tens and ones were needed for their letter. They then calculated how much those tens adn ones were worth. In small groups, the students discussed which letter was worth more and which was worth less as a way to review greater than and less than.

Place Value Flashcards to 99

To help the students with identifying larger numbers, I created a set of Place Value flashcards with both numbers and Base Ten Blocks. We use the flashcards in a variety of ways:

• drawing a number card and building it with Base Ten Blocks
• drawing a Base Ten card and writing the matching number on a dry-erase board
• playing "Around the World" with the Base Ten cards
• identify the number of Tens and Ones with the number cards by drawing sticks and dots
• drawing three cards of either number cards or Base Ten cards and ordering them from greatest to least or least to greatest
• matching number cards to Base Ten cards