Delightful Division

Just a few weeks ago when I began introducing long division, I never dreamed that I would title a blog post Delightful Division - yet here I am!  My kiddos are really starting to get it and many are even saying, "Long division is fun!"  Here are a few of the things we have done to get to that point.

Manipulatives Are A Must!

Hands on is definitely the way to go!  Getting them to understand the concrete concepts and place value is so crucial.  We have a Duck Dynasty Division theme going on, so we used the idea of them packing duck calls equally into boxes.  Then I gave them base ten blocks and we started working on two digit division problems.  The problem above shows 36/3.  The student drew three "boxes" and divided the duck calls (base ten blocks) into the boxes.  Later we worked with the idea of regrouping the tens into units when the numbers didn't work out evenly.

Going from Concrete to Representational

This picture I love because it shows a student invented method of solving the problem that she devised all on her own after using the base ten blocks. The problem above shows 598/2.  She drew two "boxes" on her board and then began to divide first by 100s, then 50s, then 40s, then ones.  Her own version of partial product method I suppose.  I really love this because she is one of my strugglers, so to see her think so out of the box is AMAZING!  I am so proud of her!

Have A Little Help From My Friends

Peer tutoring is something I believe strongly in!  I pair my kiddos who "get it" with a few who are still working on it and let them work together.  The "teacher kid" coaches as the others work along.  They love this!  They don't mind if they are coaches or the coached - they just love working with their peers.

The best part is that they are totally engaged and on-task!

They were using cards from my Don't Duck Division Long Division Style Game, but any task cards would work as well.

Games!

Speaking of the Don't Duck Division Game, we also played a lot of rounds of this game.  I love using games with my students because they hardly realize they are learning when they are playing a game!

They really loved seeing their favorite Duck Dynasty characters on the cards and have been asking me, "How did you do that Mrs. Malloy?"

We finish our division assessments on Friday and then it is on to fractions next week.  What are you working on in math?