I have had the great pleasure of working with a small group of students during the past few weeks. Our focus is on math, specifically fractions. I haven’t been in the classroom full time for a few years and, although I knew that children pretty much remain the same, I wondered how I would adjust to the “new ways of doing business.” I found some constants and some things that made my “work” a bit simpler.

As we gathered for a lesson using Skittles candies, the reception was much as it has been throughout time – utter joy. Children love candy, and nothing is better than participating in a lesson where one gets to eat one’s work product! Skittles were sorted by color and fractions were determined and a graph was created that displayed the data. Next was the part children dislike the most…having an assignment. They were given the work to complete and told the expectations that would need to be met to successfully submit the assignment. This is where things shifted. Continue reading →