Future students

Recently, I've been developing and staging 3 Act lessons for elementary students (my future students). However, who's to say the tasks can't be applied at the middle school level, or even higher.  I've been looking through the Everyday Math series our elementary school uses and have found it refreshing to see what concepts students are introduced to or expected to master at each grade level. Ironically, I came across a second grade "Exploratory" lesson that Dan Meyer recently nailed with Popcorn Picker. Second grade if you missed that.

It was fun to share the textbook scans with Dan.  Christopher Danielson jumped in with some thoughts about elementary curriculum. He works with future teachers and is a very insightful fellow! Check out his Tootsie Roll and the Ootsie.

As a middle school math teacher, this elementary stuff is all new to me, but I'm open to the challenge. Especially since I'll be helping coach a handful of teachers next year with 3 Act lessons. I'm using the summer to investigate some ideas and build up a small catalog of lessons. My working goals are to:
  1. Work on turning the abstract to concrete.
  2. Look for overlapping concepts throughout K-8 grades.
  3. Further investigate the importance & relevance of estimation.   
My first attempt is Paper Cuts - Act 1 (subconsciously inspired by Popcorn Picker and Everyday Math). Again, my intended student would be from elementary school. Would your students benefit from this task?

Lastly, it's great to know there are teachers helping students with life skills and not workbook skills. Sadie Estrella shares an experience she had this year by embracing those teaching moments we frequently have with our students. Should we eliminate 're-teach' from our vocabulary and change it to re-explore? Your thoughts on all this?

Future,
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