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Empower Students to Lead – Students as Station Facilitators

Empower Students to Lead – Students as Station Facilitators

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Students make great Family Math Night Station Facilitators. As much as I can, I use students in grades 5 and up to run my stations. Here’s why: In my September newsletter I shared an activity that I did at a recent event – ABCs and 123s. I absolutely loved watching how engaged the families were. But my favorite part of this activity was Paisley, my fifth grade station facilitator. I happened to capture her on video as she helped two students do the…

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A Fun Parent Conference Giveaway

A Fun Parent Conference Giveaway

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In my August newsletter I mentioned that I had the pleasure of hearing Dr. Karen Mapp, renowned for her work on family engagement, speak at this year’s National ESEA Conference. Then over the summer I read her co-authored book Everyone Wins! The Evidence for Family-School Partnerships & Implications for Practice. In her presentation and throughout the book, Dr. Mapp underscored the importance of moving from informing parents and caregivers about their children’s learning to including families as active participants. It begins with building relationships through on-going conversations…

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ABCs and 123s – A Family Math Night Activity

ABCs and 123s – A Family Math Night Activity

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Not every game made the cut. That’s where this activity comes in. As we were deciding which games to use in our Building Number Sense Power Pack series, we had to make some hard choices: which games stayed and which games were put back in the folder for another time.  Since this particular activity was really just that – an activity – we decided it didn’t fit in with our games theme. So in the folder it went. Until recently. I was organizing my folders and re-discovered it. And because…

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Play-N-Take 3 Math Games

Play-N-Take 3 Math Games

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I’m very excited to share with you our latest Family Math Night and parent engagement product – Play-N-Take 3. In the video below I describe these super fun and engaging math games. But first, I want to share with you two recent reports that underscore in a very big way the importance of early math skills. The first is from the Thomas B. Fordham Institute and synthesizes recent research from the Urban Institute’s Income and Benefits Policy Center. This line from the article sums…

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Insect Symmetry – A Family Math Night Activity

Insect Symmetry – A Family Math Night Activity

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Math and art. It’s always a huge hit at our Family Math Night events. Since we were using our Gellin’ with Geometry kit and the event was in the spring, I decided to tie geometry and spring together and came up with a springtime symmetry activity. Enter our insect friends. The type of symmetry I focused on was bilateral symmetry. It’s the same as mirror or reflection symmetry except that when it comes to biological creatures – like our insect friends – biologists call…

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