Math and Literature

The second Graders are enjoying working through our Geometry unit, Shapes, Blocks and Symmetry. 
In this unit, the second grades have been exploring 2-dimensional and 3-dimensional shapes and their characteristics and attributes.  Their focus has been on identifying, comparing and sorting through 2-D and 3-D shapes, with much focus on rectangles and rectangular prisms.  
One of the ways children learn and connect with these mathematical concepts is through literature.  Children's literature is used regularly in second grade in order to explain a mathematical concept, provide meaningful context for mathematical content, review a skill, or to simply increase interest level.   Our discussions always come back to the idea that math is used all around us.  When a child can make a math connection in a story, math becomes more interesting.  For children who enjoy reading, but are apprehensive about math, connecting math to literature can boost confidence. And for those who already love math can learn to appreciate stories in an entirely new way.
 One book connected to our geometric work is the fun and engaging story, Sir Cumference and the Sword in the Cone.  In this story, King Arthur has issued a challenge to the knights in the form of a riddle. Whoever solves the riddle and finds the sword, Edgecalibur, will be the future king. Two friends are given clues which lead them to Geo and Sym of Metry who help them to make the clue's flat figures into 3-D shapes. With the clue to guide them, the two discover Euler's Law which is the idea that if you add the number of faces on a geometric solid to the number of its points and subtract the number of it's edges, the answer will always be 2. This worked for all of their objects except for the cone, which lead them to dig and discover Excelsior!   The story presented many mathematical problems the children enjoyed solving, and the 2 and 3-Dimensional illustrations inspired the group to build and then illustrate their own 2-dimensional and 3- dimensional castles.
Other favorites include The Greedy Triangle and the nonfiction text, Geometry which both capture the idea that shapes are all around us.  It's exciting for children to experience math in a different day and to feel the joy and satisfaction that reading brings.

 

 

 

                      

 

 

                         

 

Math is Everywhere!

Happy New School Year!  We began the year thinking about where we can find math in our everyday lives and came to the conclusion that it is EVERYWHERE and such an important part of our lives! While many of the second graders know each other personally, we decided get to know each other by thinking about ways to describe ourselves mathematically.  It was neat to hear all the ways numbers are attached to us and the second graders had fun sharing their Math About Me projects with their peers! 

 

 

 We continued our Math is Everywhere discussion by reading two funny and engaging stories, Math Curse and Neil's Numberless World.  In Math Curse, the main character finds that "anything can be a math problem" when her elementary teacher puts a math curse on her.  In Neil's Numberless World, Neil can't understand why numbers are so important, but then gets a magic watch for his birthday and all the numbers in his world disappear.  Neil's world is turned upside down and by the end of the story, he realizes how useful numbers are after all.  We had great discussions and of course some laughs about what life would be like if numbers did not exist.


We've also spent time discussing the  importance of building a mathematical community, and practicing what that looks and sounds like.  Our community will spend each day listening respectfully to our peers, sharing ideas and strategies, communicating  ideas through pictures, numbers and words and spending ample time working together as a team and learning from one another.  We're off to a great start in second grade math and I look forward to all there is to come!

 

 

The second grade mathematicians have been working hard as usual, and have just completed our third unit, Stickers, Number Strings, and Story Problems.  Much of the unit emphasized using what the children know to make problems easier to solve, by thinking about known combinations, and noticing that order doesn't matter in addition.  They continue to work on different types of addition and subtraction story problems and on developing efficient strategies for solving problems.  In this unit the students thought about the relationship between the two operations of addition and subtraction and the way one undoes the other and how multiplication is related to addition.  It is quite impressive!
The second graders continue to learn from one another as they represent and share their work in a number of different ways.

 

The second graders also investigated even and odd numbers, using the context of partners and teams, and thought about which numbers made groups of 2, and which numbers made 2 equal groups.  This work then extended into counting by groups of 2s, 5s, and 10s.  We took a real-life approach as we skip counted our shoes, legs, and fingers and noticed patterns within these numbers. In the Counting Bags activity, they counted a set of objects in at least two different ways.  Keeping track while counting by groups is a complex task, which requires focus and organization.  The pictures show the children demonstrating these skills.

                   

There are always opportunities for a little role reversal. Here is our teacher instructing her students, :)

 

Next up, Pockets, Teeth and Favorite Things, a unit on collecting, representing, describing, and interpreting data!