Reviewing with Task Cards- Cup Punch

This is the third activity in a series of three. 

Activity 1 (Left Right Answer)

Activity 2 (Game boards) 

If you are a Pinterest stalker, you have probably seen versions of these and other versions as well. 

   

I took this and created a cup punch with task cards. 

First, I sweet talked my husband to make me a holder. I showed him the pictures on Pinterest and he made this: 

I am super lucky!!!! Yes, he sanded it and glued it together! He is so professional. (I will add that with our crazy busy schedule of baseball, he was cutting circles and sanding at 10:00 at night two days before I needed this. He could have said no, but of course he didn't.) 

I copied task cards on colored paper for fun only. Folded and put in a cup. Since we used this during a carnival theme activity, my cups had numbers at the bottom for ticket prizes. 

 

Then I covered the cups with tissue paper and a rubber band and placed in the cup holder. 

Students punched  a cup and solved the card. If they got it correct, they received that number of tickets from the bottom of the cup. 

They LOVED it and had a blast! Plus, even though it required some prep time, it was a very easy and cheap activity to create. 

Needless to say, now that I have this nifty cup holder, I am planning to use this for various activities in my class. I think the possibilities are endless. But in all honesty, you don;t need a cup holder to complete this activity. 

There are a one and gazillion activities you can use with task cards. Okay, a gazillion? Well, maybe not that many,  but seriously, I feel the list for using task cards is endless. I am always looking for ideas and ways to change things up for my students. 

I hope these three have given you a few more tools for your toolbox. 

Happy Tasking! 

Reviewing with Task Cards- Game Boards

Sharing how I am using task cards to help my students review for our state. 

This is the second in a series of 3. 

Read about first activity here. (Left, Right, Answer Game) 

For this activity, once again, I was using task cards from Live Love Math 

I chose 6 different game boards that could be used any time. 

I actually had a student with a birthday on this day so I gave his table the balloon game, just for fun. 

He was  thrilled that I remembered. 

Each group had a set of cards, a die and a counter 

(we used a different unifex cube for each table member) 

Students worked out problems on scratch paper, 

but a task card recording sheet could be used to if a grade is needed. 

Students answered the cards and if they were correct, they rolled the die and moved that number of spaces on the board. I gave each group the answer key, yes, I GAVE them the answers. 

here's what's amazing about these kids, They made sure no one was cheating! The made their table members answer the question, then they checked them, then they let them know if they were correct or not. Seriously, setting the expectations from the beginning makes all the difference. 

What I love about using these game boards is that it is.... 

S-I-M-P-L-E! 

The students loved it and once again, had great practice with test taking questions. 

And yes, like always, my students were allowed to use their journals to review these concepts. 

You can get these boards and many more here. 

There will be one more in this series soon. 

STAY TUNED! 

Reviewing with Task Cards- Left, Right, Answer

We are REVIEWING, like everyone else, for the BIG test coming up next week. 

I have a lot of material to get through, plus it has to be fun and keep my students actively engaged.  

My students use task cards for everything, so reviewing is no different. But, I did have to come up with some new ways to use them. This is the first in a series of 3 activities that I used for review this week. 

I try and make everything seem like a game and I break everything into small pieces for them. 

Enter, Jennifer from 4mula Fun. 

Her Left, Right, Answer game is PER-FECT for this. 

Here's what I did: 

I created the dice and gave students a recording sheet. There are multiple options for recording sheets based on how many task cards you use. I had 16 cards per group. 

On this day, I used the STAAR Prep review cards from Danielle over at  Live Love Math. They are written in testing format, so it is perfect for this time. Plus, for me they are TEK specific and I love that!!! 

I have six groups in my room. Two sets of tables do the same cards at a time. I differentiate by printing on different colored paper. 

I had an abundance of task cards so I sorted them into 3 groups and we played 3 rounds of the game. 

We played one on a Monday and the other two the next day. Students had about 20 minutes to play each round and that seemed like a perfect time. They stayed engaged the entire time. 

This is a game of chance because of the die. Each student had a recording sheet, but only one student has to answer the question. A student rolls the die and it either lands on left, right or answer. If it lands on left, the student to their left answers the card. If it lands on right, the student to the right answers it. If the die lands on answer, that student must answer it. 

The directions have the students "x" out the box they are not answering, I have my students write the name of the student doing the work in their box. I tell my students that everyone is involved because they must agree on the answer as a table group because they are getting one table group grade. (My students will work for candy or grades, period) 

It is really fun once they get started because sometimes the same students has to answer several questions in a row. The students are active and engaged and LEARNING.

They truly worked on math and reviewed previously learned skills. I allow my students to use their journals during the game as well. This type of activity lends itself to lots of math talk between the students. 

You can get this game here. 

Any task cards work. 

The ones I used can be found here. 

I am linking up with Holly for Tried it Tuesday. 

Be sure to check out other posts on her blog. 

Currently April

It's April! Spring is here! 

Time for Currently with Farley! 

Listening: At least I was listening to silence when I started this. Now though, my 5 year old is awake and calling me! 

Loving: Right now our weather is nice here in Texas. Fingers crossed it stays this way for today. I have 4 baseball games to watch!!! 

Thinking: Even though I forbade him, my son is turning 18. I wish he would stop getting older!!! I am wanting to make it special of course, it's a big deal! For me, this child is growing up too fast. 18 in a few days and graduation in 2 months. AAAGGHHH!!!! 

Wanting: Can I get an AMEN?! This whole state testing is ridiculous!!!! 

Needing: I have been fighting this thing all morning. I guess it knows I am trying to get stuff done. 

My name: I grew up in a town called Harker Heights. The newspaper was called The Harker Heights Herald. Fast forward a gazillion years, a collegaue and I started an end of the day writing wrap up. She named her's The Roddy's Ramblings to match her last name. My last name was Golaboff at the time. I named mine the Golaboff Gazette. When I started my blog, I wanted a cute name, but my last name was Hodges now. The first thing that came to me was The Herald from growing up, so I used it and now it has stuck!  

Well, Happy Saturday and I hope you have enjoyed learning something new about me, Be sure to check out this awesome link up with Farley!