Friday, January 13, 2012

Weekly Class Summary: Jan. 9-13

SOLs Covered: 6.2 Relationships Among Fractions, Decimals, & Percents; 6.6b & 6.7 Consumer Applications with Fractions & Decimals
Upcoming Assessments: WWU Quiz 7 (Fri. 1/20); Multiply & Divide Fractions (Fri. 1/27); Second Benchmark Test (Tues. 1/31 & Wed. 2/1)

After students completed the last spiral review quiz (as needed), we continued our work on the relationships among fractions, decimals and percents this week. With the new VA SOLs going into effect this academic year, part of this topic will now be in the non-calculator section. We started by reviewing converting/comparing fractions and decimals (Math 5) and converting/comparing both with percents (new to Math 6) without the calculator. Afterwards, students copied three conversion charts of the most commonly used (and tested) fractions, decimals, and percents. Students were told that by memorizing these (tenths/fifths, eighths/fourths, and sixths/thirds), they would eliminate much of the difficulty and work that can accompany these questions.

"Flower Power" on MangaHigh.com

Students were able to show off a little of their artistic side with this unit when they made mosaic pictures, which they then used to calculate the amounts (as a fraction, decimal, and percent) of each color used to create the whole picture. They have also been given the opportunity to extend the activity for themselves by creating other mosaic pictures (accompanied by the math behind them) for Stingray Points (the amount award will vary depending on the complexity of the work). A huge "THANK YOU" to Ms. Ferguson (the art teacher) for the donation of extra construction paper for the assignment.


Thanks to Esther P, Leonardo C, and Elvin R's donations of several bags of Skittles®, first and fourth block classes also started (or will start next week for fourth) an activity that will be built upon several times throughout next term. This activity involved calculating the percent of each color represented in a bag of Skittles® and will later be connected our work with proportions, probability, and statistics. Second will hopefully be able to complete the activity as well, but we still need donations to make this happen. I would love to be able to provide the materials myself, but I'm unable to do so at this time and the school does not have the funds to finance all of the fun activities all of our teachers wish to complete. Any and all donations are so greatly appreciated and students are always thanked for their generosity with Stingray Points.

After completing the quiz on F/D/P, we shifted our focus onto consumer applications revolving around "real world" fraction and decimal problems. There will be a huge emphasis on word problems, but we will "jazz up" the unit with a fun (and practical!) look at personal finance/money management. We will officially kick-start the unit next week with a viewing of Extreme Couponing©, which the students are already eagerly anticipating.

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