February 24, 2022
For today’s warm-up, we looked at something called Target Numbers. The first problem required students to use two numbers and one of each operation to make the number -4. The second problem used two numbers and one operation to make 15. Students did really well with these two problems and some student examples are below.
Next, we were reviewing Order of Operations. Students were asked to recall the acronym for calculating the correct order of operations. We talked about the acronyms BEDMAS, PEMDAS, BODMAS, BIDMAS, PIMDAS. We worked through several examples together. Questions progressively became more challenging. I like to start with questions that are accessible to the majority of the class and they work towards questions that are more challenging.
The last two questions focused on negative signs and brackets. This led to a great discussion about what happens if the negative symbol is inside vs. outside of the brackets. We talked about how an even or odd exponent impacts our solution.
The class did very well on these introductory questions.
I had my students work on these Boom Cards next. The objective was to create the biggest number possible by dragging and dropping the given integers into the template provided. My students really like Boom Cards because they are self-checking and give immediate feedback.
The last topic that we talked about today was The Real Number System. My colleague made nested boxes similar to the ones shown below. Thank you for the Inspiration!
Finally, we looked at the definitions of the components of the real number systems followed by placing integers into the correct spaces. There was some discussion and debate about where -6/3 belonged on the nested diagram. Initially, the class wanted to place it with rational numbers and then some other students pointed out that the fraction could be simplified to -2, which meant it belonged with the integers. Where would you place it?
That took us to the end of the period.
I hope something here was able to help you on your teaching journey.
Have a fantastic day!