Spring Math Centers: Whimsical Recipes

In March, as we all impatiently waited for spring to arrive, I brought a huge bag of silk flowers to the classroom for the kids to explore. With snow on the ground and colder than average temperatures outside, we had colorful little reminders inside that spring *should* soon be on its way.

Initially, my idea for the flowers was to sort by color and create rainbow designs and patterns, but my students had different ideas... and began cooking with them in the play kitchen area one day during yet another indoor recess. They made a colorful mess of flowers filling every pot, pan and cup available. The kids served up flower tea, flower muffins, flower cake, flower pie, flower pizza and much more! My students became a little obsessed with the flower cooking so I began exploring how I could sneak in a little play-based math practice. 

At first, I scribbled some quick Flower Pie recipes on scrap paper with markers and showed them how they could record their own recipes by drawing pictures.

Before I knew it, students were creating their own recipes, drawing their pie creations, talking about numbers and making comparisons all on their own!

The following weekend, I sat down and created this huge pack (there are over 100 pages!) of play-based math activities using silk flowers and other materials that can easily be found at the Dollar Tree (or maybe even things you already have in your own kitchen at home or supply closet at school)!  I introduced the activities a few weeks ago and they've been a huge hit.

Contents

Since I have such a wide range of ages and abilities in my own classroom, I created activities that are easily differentiated and enticing to students between Preschool and Kindergarten age.The simplest activities focus on visual perception and include a sort by color or size activity with printable vases for sorting...

... and many activities that focus on visual perception and copying skills.

There are over 50 different recipe cards that focus on counting and creating sets of up to 10 items.  Recipe cards for quantities 1-5 and 5-10 are included for flower pie, flower pizza and flower ice cream!

Several three-dimensional printables are included which require some simple assembly. Sorting 'vases' for sorting by color, size and creating sets up to 10 are included. Simply print, cut the page in half along the dotted line, roll into a tube and tape the edge where marked. Along with the Flower Ice Cream activity, I've included a template for an ice cream cone. Simply print, cut around the edge of the template, roll into a cone shape and tape or glue the edge where marked.

Each activity also has a 'make your own' option (in color or black and white) where students can fill in the numerals to create their own recipes, place the flowers on or draw a picture of their recipe.

Materials

You'll need to purchase an assortment of silk flowers and some inexpensive props to go with the activities. Silk flowers can be found relatively cheaply at the Dollar Tree; look for stems that have smaller flowers with many blooms for the counting activities. You'll need the following colors: pink, red, orange, yellow, blue, purple and white. Blue flowers were the most difficult to find, but with a little searching I was able to find enough.  I bought about 2 stems of flowers for each color spending between $12-14. Leave the flowers on the stems for the color, size and counting vases activities; remove the flowers from the stem for the recipe card activities.

Depending on which activities you want to do with your group, you might need a pie pan, a pizza pan, a muffin tin with 6 spaces and a muffin tin with 12 spaces; I found everything except the 12 space muffin tin at the Dollar Tree. I think that I purchased my 12 space muffin tin from a thrift store for less than $2.

Lastly, I made a pie crust and pizza crust for my activities out of an old tan sweater by tracing my pan and cutting out a circle. If you don't have an old tan sweater (who knows why I had it laying around!) you could use tan felt or fleece from the fabric store (the edges of these fabrics will not fray and do not need to be hemmed); take your pan to the store with you so you know exactly how much to buy.

I also made this lattice-top crust (completely optional!) for my activity by cutting a second circle into 1/4-1/2" strips, arranging them in a crisscross, over/under pattern and hot gluing where the strips overlapped.

Check out this YouTube video for instructions on how to make a lattice-top crust design:

Prep

Most of the material prep is pretty simple. Just print, laminate and cut. If you print the recipe cards as they are, most of them are 1/2 a page (2 per page). I found that I preferred most of them smaller and adjusted my print settings to include two pages per sheet (4 cards per page); printing the cards smaller also saves on supplies including ink, card stock and lamination!

If you're not sure how to adjust the print size to two pages per sheet, this video by 3rdGrThoughts explains it well:

   

#anchorword: OBSERVE

My #anchorword recently has been: OBSERVE.

Lately, I've worked to focus my energy on more closely observing my own classroom and engaging in opportunities to observe other classrooms and teachers. I've found that peer observations, both those that I've done in other classroom and those that have been done by other teachers in my own classroom have been very beneficial for my professional growth and development. However, in general, I think that that most teachers don't often get many opportunities to visit with other teachers, watch how and what they're teaching and gain fresh ideas to bring back to their own classrooms.

Of course good educators know that so much can be learned by watching others teach, but when do we really have the time (and energy) do do it?!

Teachers get so caught up with the immediate needs of their own classrooms, preparing for assessments, planning lessons, collecting data ..... not to mention fighting for livable wages, dealing with politics and paperwork and so much more....  that we feel drained, overworked and overwhelmed far too much of the time. And people wonder why teacher burnout rates are so high in the first few years?!


What is Peer  Observation? 


Peer Observation is an innovative but often under-utilized and lesser-known professional development tool for educators. While traditional observations done by administrators leave most teachers feeling stressed and anxious, peer observations are far less traumatic and can be beneficial for both participants. 


Peer observation is a type of collaborative professional development that occurs between two or more educators. While there are many different peer observation models out there, the essential components for productive observations include: an observer, a teacher delivering instruction and scheduled time for discussion before and after the observation. There are many other factors concerning the teacher and observer that may impact the effectiveness of peer observation including experience level, communication skills, personality types, comfort and trust level, level of administrative support etc.

The process that I generally follow for conducting or hosting a peer observation includes the following steps: Plan, Observe, Reflect, Discuss, Apply, Evaluate.

1. PLAN - This part is relatively simple. I set up the observation AND a time to discuss following the observation (ideally immediately afterwards) with the teacher, ask a few basic questions about what the teacher will be teaching, if there is anything that I should know before my visit etc. I also ask the teacher if there is anything they want me to look for during the observation; perhaps  they have a professional development goal that they've been working on and would like feedback.

2. OBSERVE - This step is also reasonably clear. I sit, watch and listen actively; I try to stay objective and stick with the facts of what I see and hear. Usually, I take notes about what what's going, what the students are doing, how the teacher manages the group, what the lesson is on, how the class is set up... I might write down ideas that I think I could try, thoughts about how the observation applies to my classroom etc. Be sure to write down questions that you want to ask the teacher later!

3. REFLECT - After the observation is over, I usually spend a few minutes reflecting on what I saw. In this step, I consider my thoughts and feelings about the observation rather than the objective facts of what I actually saw and heard. What did I like? What didn't I like? Why do I feel as I do? Following an observation, I often take a quick assessment of how I feel; was the group chaotic or calm? How do I think that the students felt in that class?

4. DISCUSS - During this time, I chat with the teacher about what I saw and ask the questions that I noted during my observation. This also might be the time that the teacher asks for thoughts about his/her teaching, the strategies that were used or perhaps ideas from the observer. Remember that peer to peer observation is NOT evaluative.

5. APPLY - Choose a concept or idea from the observation to try in your own classroom. Note how it worked out, further questions that you have about the idea or changes that you made to the idea to make it work in your classroom. This information from your application might be valuable to discuss in a follow up chat with that teacher in the future.

6. EVALUATE - Remember we're not evaluating the teacher. Evaluate the peer observation process. Consider how to make the process more valuable and beneficial, what parts were most helpful and what wasn't necessarily valuable.

This is the form that I use (you can grab it for FREE here!)

My Experience with Peer OBSERVATION

I recently stepped out of my own classroom and spent an entire day observing at another Montessori school just a few hours from my own. As the only Montessori teacher working at my school, I often feel like I teach alone on my own island that few people really understand. When I have questions or challenges in my classroom, I can't just walk down the hall to ask a colleague for advice. Sure, I have plenty of professional connections online that I could ask, but it's not quite the same as real live coworkers.

Fortunately, I have an AMAZING and supportive administrator who encourages teachers to visit other programs, see what other teachers are doing, connect with like-minded professionals and find fresh ideas to bring back to our own classrooms. She realizes that the short time that teachers might be out of the classroom for a professional day is exponentially beneficial for both the teachers and the students. Of course, it isn't that I get to take professional days all that often, but I fee lucky that I do get a few here and there!

Although I work alone most of the time (aside from my classroom assistant) I felt less alone while observing other Montessori teachers. It was refreshing to see a a few different classrooms, get ideas for new activities and observe how the teachers interact with their students. I took pages and pages of notes on various topics from ideas for new lessons, variations on old lessons, ideas for classroom set up, new ways to plan lessons and ideas for recording and using data. I had a chance to chat with several of the teachers that I observed and it felt great to be able to chat about the classroom and connect with others professionally. It was even nice to realize that the problems that I encounter in my classroom are not isolated only to my group of students; the teacher struggle is absolutely real!

When was the last time that you had a chance to really OBSERVE another teacher work in their classroom? What do you think the greatest benefit of professional observation is?

yea for summer - still here, but super busy!

It's been far too long since my last post... between a back injury in April, my own busy preschooler, IEPs, assessments, parent-teacher meetings, end of year events, grant writing and a few top-secret extra special projects, I just haven't been able to keep up with everything!

Those of you who are paying attention, stay tuned -- I've got some fun posts coming up including a few product reviews, colorful arts & crafts activities, messy outdoor play, field trips to local attractions and lots of Ocean & Beach themed excitement - our summer school theme this year!