In her latest video for Teacher, Mathematics teacher Holly Millican shares the resources for 2 activities she has implemented in her classroom to engage students when learning about decimals.
‘Now what I really love about activities such as the ones I’m going to take you through is that in New South Wales, decimals is one of those topics that is introduced from early Stage 1. So students, by the time they get to high school, already have a level of familiarity with the content and with the vocabulary,’ Holly explains.
‘So activities such as these can go into a little bit more depth than other activities, where the content is new and the students are unfamiliar with the vocabulary surrounding it. I really find that students coming with that level of prior knowledge really allows these activities to increase their depth of knowledge and really form a solid foundation to move forwards through their high school years.’
In the video, Holly shares 2 activities she plays in the last 10 to 15 minutes of class to wrap up a lesson.
For Decimal Dice, Holly gets students to split into pairs, with each student rolling their die until they reach the set number length (which can be scaffolded depending on the class level). ‘This game is all about students understanding place value, as well as greater than, less than and equals to symbols.’
And in Decimal Deduction, students pair up to work on their vocabulary surrounding decimals, and to practice communicating with each other mathematically. ‘Decimal Deduction … requires students to pop on their Sherlock Holmes hat, and work with a partner to deduce which decimal has been chosen,’ Holly explains. She also outlines 2 different ways the game can be played, depending on the level students are working at.
Find out more in the video below, and click the links to access worksheets for the activities mentioned by Holly:
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