Counting Counts!!!

The title of Year 1 Unit 6 Mathematics assessment for this week. Sounds catchy, and exciting... 

The first 3 weeks of Unit 6 in the Australian Curriculum has seen Year 1 focusing on Number Sense. And after 3 straight weeks most, if not all of my class has a very solid understanding of counting, skip counting by 1's, 2's, 5's, 10's to 100 and place value (imagine here my leap of joy at such success!!!) 

The Curriculum so far this year hasn't delved into one area in such depth, usually only allotting 3 or so days to a topic. This Unit has been far the best learning experience for the kids...

The assessment piece was a fun, hands on activity conducted during weekly maths rotates - how easy was this to be??? 

The Australian Curriculum provides everything needed for the assessment piece from the hands-on pieces ...

... which I changed to make larger, child-usable and laminated...

... to the 'cheat-sheet' of prearranged questions to ask each student...

And the kids loved doing the tasks, 4 in all, and didn't realise they were being assessed...

So, another assessment ticked off for this term in Mathematics! Next week (Week 8) has my class moving onto 3 lessons of time (o'clock and half-past) followed by 2 lessons on capacity. 

Off now to hunt out some suitable resources (read: prowl blogs, Pinterest and TpT!!!)

i give a gonski...

Last Friday, after school, an email came through to all staff advising that we were now all on 'photocopying rations' due to the school budget! And we are only 3/4's of the way through the school term. It is going to be one long 11 week term now. 

I guess that the Gonski review for funding needs to be implemented quickly, as my school is in desperate need of extra funding for the basics. Considering we are only allowed 5 sheets per student per week it isn't really hard to cut back, so now is the time for me to whip up some work centres that don't require any sheets. Most of my literacy stations have an accompanying activity sheet, so I need to think quickly.

First off is a Silly Sentence activity that Monica has at her TpT store, and I adapted it to fit in with what my class is learning at the moment,  pulling in a lot of our sight words, and changed the American words to Australian (Mom to Mum).

Each Silly Sentence is based around the Who, What, Where, When model, and colour coded to match. Using the spinner each student has to collect 1 piece of the sentence from each colour, before creating their sentence. Now normally I would have the kids then record their sentence on the accompanying sheet and illustrate, but for now it will have to be completed in their literacy books. Guess it will now be extra handwriting practice between the red and blue lines!

The spinner is an easy one that works every time. The child uses a pen and a paperclip and simply flicks the paperclip. It spins soooo easily. Covers a little of fine motor for the day!

The next one I pulled together over the weekend is based around the School's Multilit words. 

There are 300 words in lists of 10 (nothing new there!) and each list is coloured in the same colours across the school. I laminated up the first 100 words to display in my room this week.

I am also planning on taking deeper look at how ...

... has organising her sight words. She has put together a brilliant expanding folder to organise the different levels.

So I can see lots of rainbow writing, playdough words etc happening in group time, all without the dreaded photocopied piece of paper. 

Now I am on the asking side, I am after any and all of your best and fun ideas for literacy centres that don't involve photocopying. Activities that you rely on or find that the class just love....

Helping Hand...

Well today I am extending out a hand to a fellow Aussie teacher, who is super-into Maths. If you ever need a creative idea in the area of maths, then Alison from ...

Teaching Maths with Meaning

the rambles of a primary school teacher passionate about Mathematics

should be your first port of call. 

Teaching Maths with Meaning has excellent Free Resources, and who of us doesn't love a Freebee!!! From Posters to Place Value Cards, this site has it all. 

And if you like the look of these, head over to her TpT store, were you will find a massive amount of products, already to be used in the classroom. 

So, time to share some bloggy love, and head over to 

Teaching Maths with Meaning 

and see what Alison has on offer today!