Today I am linking up with my friend Holly over at Fourth Grade Flipper for Tried it Tuesday.
Today we had Professional Development and for the first time in a long time I actually learned something new! Our PD was great and I couldn't wait to share one of the tools we played with today. Our district is focusing on Writing PD this year and today's focus was on Writing to Learn, Writing to Apply in Math. I will be sharing more of the great stuff I learned today as I use it in my Math instruction.
Do you use cubes in your lessons? You know the ones where you write a question or prompt on each side and students roll and respond to the prompt or question. Do you find an old copy of your cube master and handwrite questions onto each side of the cube? Well here is your life saver, readwritethink.org Cube Creator!
You can find the Cube Creator under the Classroom Resources Tab or use this LINK. There are three pre-made cubes available for reading skills, but if you choose the Create-Your-Own-Cube option the possiblities are endless!
Our focus was on Math today so my team and I created a cube for each of the vocabulary words in our next unit, Area & Perimeter. In the Question box we wrote the following questions for each side:
1. This reminds me of when we learned about...
2. Write related words to _________. (Or list synonyms)
3. Draw a picture to represent ________.
4. How can I use this word in real life?
5. Write a sentence using the word ___________.
6. Write the definition of __________.
We used the vocabulary words: area, perimeter, addition, multiplication, width, and length.
Students answer each of the questions on the cube template, cut, and glue their cube together. Some of the ideas we discussed were having each student at the teams complete a different vocabulary cube and then roll their teammates cubes to review the other terms. We also discussed having teams complete the cube template using the cooperative learning structure Round Table.
I also created a cube for this week's Spelling words. We are working on the prefix semi and multi. I am going to have students complete their cubes during our Reading Foundations time. I wrote the following tasks:
1. Define the prefix semi
2. Define the prefix multi
3. Draw a picture for the prefix semi
4. Draw a picture for the prefix multi
5. Create a list of words with the prefix semi
6. Create a list of words with the prefix multi
One of the features I like about the Cube Creator is you can save, print, and email your cube! I can't wait to use these cubes this week and see how much my students enjoy them.
