Math Practice

Basic math facts are so important for students. I noticed that many of my students lacked the memorization of basic math facts. I was introduced to xtramath.com from my children's teachers. They started working on xtramath as a part of their homework.

I introduced my students to the program, it is a free website to help practice the basic facts with students. It tracks their progress and shows them what they need to work on. Students earn a certification for completing all of their addition fact, then a different one for subtraction, multiplication and division.

I've already seen a lot of progress in my students with their mental math by knowing their basic math facts. It only takes 3-5 minutes each day for the students to practice their facts. The website can be accessed on a laptop, desktop, chrome book or an iPad. My students use our iPads and desktops in our classroom.

I hope you can use it to help your students improve on their basic math facts.   :)

Google Classroom

I absolutely love having Google classroom for my students. At first, it took a little time setting things up because I hadn't created a contact group for my students, but I didn't let that slow me down.

One of my favorite uses for classroom.google.com is for my students to turn in assignments. When I create a writing assignment, students can add their writing to the assignment and I can collaborate with them (this was very helpful with our Ecosystems projects) a lot quicker than it would be to meet with every group in person. I can add comments and look at their writing from my couch or at planning time. They can look at the comments and suggestions. We only have to discuss any information that still isn't clear. This frees up so much of my time. I can also quickly see who hasn't turned the assignment in, and remind them of the due date. 

I also love using the announcement portion to quickly and easily share websites that they can refer back to later. I've used this for math games to play to reinforce a specific skill. We have also used this to give links for coding sites and the order I would like them to try them in. 

Ever since I've gotten my hands on it, I've had hundreds of ideas of how it could be used in the classroom. I need to make a list of things that I want to do differently next year. 

My absolutely favorite part of the site is how easy it makes sharing documents with my students. Instead of my incoming files/email blowing up, it puts them neatly in a "classroom" folder in my documents, it is then inside a folder with the name of the assignment on the folder. I LOVE it.