Today in Pre-Algebra, we finished up our lesson on using proportions to find percents and then spent the rest of the class reviewing for the proportions text next class. Students gave a lot of positive feedback on the way we did both these activities. Nothing super ground breaking but engaging and provided great opportunity for me to do informal formative assessments.
POST IT PROBLEMS
I had 5 proportion problems for students to do. I paired them up and they were to do the following:
- try to solve the problem independently
- discuss their methods with their partner when they both finished
- come to a consensus
- write down what they did and their answer on a post it
- put their post it next to the problem on the board
I could’ve used some tech to do this but it’s just more fun to write it down and put it up on the board. Students were able to see what other students did and if their thinking matched others. I was also able to see which problems seemed to have the most misconceptions.
REVIEW FOR THE TEST
This activity wasn’t significantly different. I posted the following slide show and we went through one problem at a time:
Students did the following:
- Tried to solve on their own
- Discussed with their partner their method/reasons/answer
- Put their answer into Socrative (all students had their own computer and were logged in).
Using Socrative, I could see if there were quite a few different answers. If so, I went through that example (or, depending on time, have several students share their thinking on why they thought they were right). The problem on slide 5 offered some really great discussions between students on how to view the similar figures and see which sides were proportional (it also sort of led to conversations about reflections vs rotations).
I tried to incorporate a movement element where I would have students change partners after each problem or two so they could hear different perspectives and methods, but the students said they didn’t feel it was necessary and would’ve preferred to stay seated and not lug their journal and computer around after each problem.
From a management perspective, whenever we were about to go over a problem, I made sure all students had their computers closed or the screens tilted down. When we were doing transitions I gave them 20 seconds to find a new partner. If they finished early and were waiting on others to put their answers in, they could continue work on their math reflection journal or work on a Khan Academy mastery challenge.
What engaging review activities have you found to be successful in your class?
I am going to try the post it next week, great ideas!