Using mini white boards for an algebra review

This morning I started the algebra review using the textbook questions, but had the students solve the problems on mini white boards.  I first divided the class into groups of three.  I then gave each student a mini whiteboard and a marker.  I had the review questions from the text book on an overhead.  I showed them one question at a time.  I made it into a little game.  Each student was to solve it on their own white board.  They were then to compare and discuss their answers with their group.  Then as a group they had to decide which answer, if their answers were different, was the correct answer and write it on one of the whiteboards.  Once I recognised that all the groups were done, I would count down from 5 and ask them to reveal their answers.  At that point one person in the group would hold up their white board.  I would quickly scan to see who had the correct answer.  Each team with the correct answer would get a point and I tracked the points on the board.  If a team had the incorrect answer I would quickly mention to them where they had gone wrong.  It worked really well, the students were all very involved.  A simple way to make textbook work a little bit more exciting.  Sorry about the shaky video, I was using one hand.

Tables of Values and Sticky Notes

I tried a little something with creating a table of values today.  I wrote 5 equations and then made a table of values for each equation.  I split the class into 6 groups, and gave each group a section of board and some yellow and green sticky notes.  I then randomly put up all my 'x' values on the screen and told each group to write each one of the values on a yellow sticky note and spread them out on the top of a desk.  I then randomly put up all my 'y' values on the screen and told each group to write each one of the values on a green sticky note and spread them out on the top of another desk.  I then got each group to write the 5 equations on their section of the board with a blank table of values underneath.  At this point, I gave them each the first 'x' value of each equation and the task was to now find all the ordered pairs for each equation.  They needed to place all their stick notes on the board in one of the table of values.  So in the end, they should have used all their sticky notes.   It is difficult to explain without seeing it.  It took a few minutes and a bit of prompting to get the students going on it, but once they got going, each group was working together very well. They had to do some mental math and understand how to fill in a table of values. It was quite a successful task, a nice change from just having them fill in a chart over and over again on paper.

Algebra and Bingo

I don't know about all of you, but it has been tough getting back in the swing of things this week.  I finally got somewhat motivated today in my math class.  I started the Algebra unit this week and was trying to think of what to do to make it more interesting than just doing worksheets.  Yesterday I taught solving 2-step equations and gave them a few practice questions.  Today, rather than just giving them a worksheet I made the worksheet into a game of bingo.  I gave each student a 5 x 5 table.  Then I put 30 numbers up on the board and asked them to randomly fill in their charts with these numbers, with no numbers repeating.  Once they had their charts filled in, I put one question up on the board.. They then each solved the question individually and shaded in the answer if it was on their chart.  After I got the sense that everybody had finished the question, I would put a new question on the board.  Once somebody got a row of 5, they were to call bingo.  We got through 15 questions before anyone got a bingo.  So rather than giving them a worksheet of 15 questions where they would've likely complained, we played a game of bingo.  Every student attempted and most completed each question and not one person complained.  Matter of fact, they were asking me for the next question.  So overall, they got through as many, if not more practice questions than they would've if they were working on a worksheet.