Remedy the Remainder Problem!

Oh my goodness, it is time for remainders. To ease the transition of "Having something leftover," (GASP!!!!) We are worked on some story problems all week to help us understand. 

 On Monday the fun began with a sort. Students worked in teams to read the problems and determine how they were going to interpret the remainder. We named our three ways to interpret drop it, round it, and use it. This was a showstopper for use of mathematical language!

I was so impressed with my students and how they reasoned with one another about how to interpret the remainder. They asked each other questions like, "Are you just going to leave those students out?" or "Leftover, doesn't that mean we use the remainder as the answer?"

It was a tremendous way for me to see right there who was getting it and who wasn't. I wandered the room with my clipboard in hand checking off students who were getting it, those who at least had the gist, and who I needed to pull to go over the skill more. If only it were always that easy!

The next day we went on a scavenger hunt. This set of cards comes with 28 problems that are actually three mini-sets with two, three, and four digit divisors. I copied each set on a different colored-paper and hung them around the room.

Each student was assigned a color (differentiation for the win!) to locate and complete. I had my students use a piece of paper of the same color, to remind them what they were looking for, to answer their problems instead of the recording sheet. This made it really easy for me to look around the room to ensure everyone was working on an appropriate problem. Since we were still new to the idea, I had students check in with me after they solved each problem to make sure they were on the right track.

The only thing that would have made it better is if I would have remembered to take pictures of it while it was happening... blogging fail, but alas I am human.

Finally, after a few days of working problems in different ways it was time to assess. I chose four "random" cards to display, and everyone solved them on their own.