Monday, September 29, 2014

Welcome to Math-a-lot!

Our first Mathematical Quest of the year took us to the magical land of Math-a-lot. The Navigators and the Spirits gathered together and were given an open-ended math task to figure out a better way to count all the people coming to the king-sized birthday party for King Arthur. Over the course of two days we went from utter chaos to an orderly way of keeping track of all the people. We then had a great discussion of what worked best, what didn't work, how we worked together, the different ways we kept track and how the base ten system works. 

The letter that was awaiting us as we came to math class

The book that inspired us

Eager to become "bean counters"
Careful not to "spill the beans"

Putting beans into groups of 1's and 10's

Using a place value chart

Keeping a tally

Finding 10 groups of 10 to make 100

Bowls helped us keep track

Let the trading begin
ten 1's = one 10
ten 10's = one 100
ten 100's = one 1000

The numbers start to add up

Now we know: two bags of beans equals 5694!
That's a lot of guests to feed!


Tuesday, September 16, 2014

September, 2014 We're eager to begin our year of QUEST!

New clothes, new school supplies, new friends, new school year!
We're eager to begin our year of "QUEST"!

What is a quest? What is your quest?
Why do people embark on quests and how do quests evolve through time?
What things does one need for a quest? What are some helpful tools?
What are the characteristics of people who successfully complete a quest?
What quests can be found in literature, history and other subject areas?

HERE WE GO!