Why am I posting a picture of a messy whiteboard you might ask? Well this serves as evidence of my third grade math group's creative problem solving from this week. One of our ALP goals for the year is under the heading "Creativity/ Innovation." The goal for third grade is two part: →I compared different approaches to solving math problems and found new ways to solve a problem. →I looked for patterns to create shortcuts to simplify my problem solving method. We have been working on solving story problems all year. This particular story problem asked the students to solve this - "Becca gave Jeremy $30. He spent $4 each day. How much money did he spend in a week? How much money did he have left after a week?" My third graders now understand the concepts of division, multiples, factors, multiplication as repeated addition, and even some basic algebra (a X 5 = 30.) And by the looks of this whiteboard, they are now able to use their logic to solve this problem using many of these methods. We discussed how problems in real-life have many solutions a lot of the time. We also discussed if there is a "better" solution - the answer was no BUT there are definitelyquicker solutions. With our story problem of the week and sharing/discussion, we move closer and closer to that goal of building their brains' capacity to look for creative solutions and seeing patterns. Who knows what problems these great mathematicians will be solving 15 years from now? We can hope that building their capacity for multiple solutions will benefit all of us in amazing ways once these kids are the problem solvers of tomorrow!
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Tracey BeanWerner Elementary Archives
May 2018
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