Differentiation Station Creations

Learning Ideas, Teaching Resources, Free Printables

Pulling Teeth: Subtraction

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Hands-On Dental Health Activities

Check out these hands-on dental health activities. Use fun manipulatives to explore concepts of subtraction and addition. Kids can “pull out teeth” for subtraction, count teeth with tools from the dentist, and so much more!  Hands On Activities: Dental Health. Tons of ideas to add to your unit on teeth and dental health. Fun!

Dental Health is such an intriguing thing for young children. Explore subtraction with young children through the concept of losing teeth. They are already fascinated with the idea of losing their own teeth, so it is the perfect way to explore subtraction!

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Interactive Play Dough Mats: Bubbles!

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http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Interactive-Play-Dough-Mats-Counting-Centers-Games-Printables-Bubbles-1652752
Kids love working with play dough!  It makes practice with any skill turn into a game!  I have a bunch of different themed play dough packs, but my daughter requested a set of bubble play dough mats.  I decided on a bubble bath pack!  You pick it up here.
 
There are two components to each set of centers:
Interactive Play Dough Mats
Students will draw cards with numerals, ten frames, or addition sentences. Students will create play dough on their mat to represent the numeral, numbers on the ten frame or addition sentence. Students will complete an extension worksheet after using this center. Extension worksheets include: counting and writing the numeral, drawing the correct number of themed objects when give a number, drawing the correct number of themed objects when given a ten frame.
 
Use manipulatives, dry erase markers, or play dough to represent the numerals, ten frames, or addition sentences.
Ten Frames and Numerals 
Addition Skills
There are bunches of prinatbles that can be used in a center, or as an extension activity.  The printables will reinforce the skills that students practice with the play dough mats.
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Interactive-Play-Dough-Mats-Counting-Centers-Games-Printables-Bubbles-1652752

Interactive Play Dough Mats with Numerals
Students will identify numerals and add the correct number of themed manipulatives, or use play dough. Complete extension activities in representing a number of objects with a written numeral, use one-to-one correspondence to count out a specific number of objects and draw a pictorial representation of those objects, and trace and write numerals 1-10.

Use manipulatives to trace the numerals.  Students will count out the same number of ducks.

 Students can use a dry erase marker to trace the numeral. 

 Students can count out the duck manipulatives to represent the number.

 Students can use play dough to create the numeral.  This is great for tactile and kinesthetic learners.  They can build the numeral and trace the numeral.  

Students can also use play dough to create the same number of ducks or bubbles.

 There are tons of printables to extend their learning!

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Interactive-Play-Dough-Mats-Counting-Centers-Games-Printables-Bubbles-1652752

Tons of fun!

Have the students color in the ducks, as they count each one.  This will help with one-to-one correspondence.

 A bunch of choices for tracing and writing numerals 1-10.

Hope you enjoy this pack!  I am giving one away tomorrow morning.  You can leave a comment here for a chance to win!  Have a great weekend!  You can pick up the pack, here, for 50% off for the next 48 hours.


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Get Up and Move!!

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We are in winter now and it is cold outside!!  As the weather gets colder, sometimes recess and outdoor play is limited.  As a parent and teacher, I know that kids need movement.  They concentrate and learn better when they are able to use their muscles and move around.  What better way to encourage movement, than to include it in your regular teaching routine.  Students don’t even realize that they are learning when they are able to move and “play” around the room. 
So some teacher friends and I have teamed up to load you up with resources to make teaching a bit easier!  We’ve included tons of resources that pair movement with learning and fun.  Grab hold of student’s attention with these engaging games and activities!!
 
I have two of my resources in the pack.  They are perfect for winter math!  One of my favorites is Snowball Addition!  There is a variety of centers and games to get your students interacting with numbers.  One of my favorite parts of this pack is the student made number line.  You print out the snowballs and have students create a number line on your floor.  It gets them invested in the number line.
I also provide “focus wands” to get the students to narrow their focus to individual numbers on the number line.  These are easy to make and use. 
There are individual number lines and a large class number line.  This allows students to follow along on their own personal number line.  You can work on addition, greater and less than with these number lines.  I used them with a preschooler, first grader, and second grader.  It was very easy to differentiate for each of their needs.
Here is a student “knocking on” the larger number and counting on.  It helps those kinesthetic learners to physically count on from the larger number.
We played WAR with the numeral cards.  This is great for understanding greater and less than, but still has the novelty of a game.  Moving the focus wand along the number line really helps visual and kinesthetic learners.  They are able to see the physical distance between two numbers and to actually move their focus wands forward or backward.
 We also played WAR (or had a snowball fight, as my kids called it) with addition cards.  Each player flipped over a card, moved their focus wand along the number line to add the two numbers, and determined who had the largest sum.  Great fun!
There is a set of snowball mats included in the pack.  Students will practice addition sentences with, or without, manipulatives.  Students will add sums to 10, sums of 10, doubles, and sums to 20.  We used the snowflake manipulatives that are included, as well as marshmallows.  Can you guess which was the favorite???
 Students will also be able to practice working with missing addends.  Again, there are four different sets of mats: sums to 10, sums of 10, doubles, and sums to 20.  You can differentiate for your students’ abilities.
There are also a bunch of Roll & Cover games.  There are three different options.  Choose the one game boards that are appropriate for your students.  I include adding 2 dice.  Students will roll the dice, add the two numbers together, search for the sum, cover the sum if they have it.  First person to cover all their snowballs, wins the snowball fight!
Students can also work on adding doubles.  They will roll one die and add it to itself.
 The last option is rolling 3 dice.  Students can use their number lines to add all the numbers together.
I also have another great pack for getting kids up and moving!  Let’s Get Hopping is such a fun way to explore skip counting.  You can check out Emmy Mac’s post!  I want to be in her class 🙂
 
I hope your kids love these activities as much as mine do!  It’s great to get them up and moving AND learning!!
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Full retail value of $37.25 and only available for a limited time.  $13.99 which is 63% off!  Extreme value alert!
Includes 9 instant downloads and 532 pages of materials including centers, printables, author studies, crafts, lap books, and much, much more.
Academic Concepts Covered
addition to 20
missing addends
number lines
adding doubles
skip counting
subtraction to 10
2D shapes
patterns
story elements
sight words
decoding CVC words
writing
 
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63% off and only for a limited time!  Head on over to Educents to stock up for the kinder and first grade classrooms!  
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Math Manipulative Round Up!

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I am a huge believer in hands-on learning.  Students are able to become active participants in their own learning through using manipulatives.  They are able to learn by physically handling and manipulating objects to explore a concept.
I love using manipulatives with math concepts.  It really transforms a concept into a concrete learning experience.  Young children and kinesthetic learners really benefit from showing the concept and bringing it to life.
Math manipulatives do not need to be expensive.  You can look around your own home and classroom to create some simple and effective manipulatives for your math lessons.
Here are some fun posts on DIY math manipulatives from me and some amazing bloggers:
Greater Gator

Addition Machine

New and Improved Addition Machine

Decomposing Monster from Crayons & Cuties in Kindergarten
Composing Monster from Crayons & Cuties in Kindergarten

 Play Dough as a Manipulative

Reindeer Romp: Addition and Subtraction

Hope you found a manipulative that works for you!  I would love to have you leave me a comment with any fun math manipulatives that you use with your students.  I love DIY projects and would love some new ideas to make the math concepts come to life!
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Pumpkin Mania!

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I love fall!  The crispness in the air, the pumpkin patches, and cozy scarves.  I especially love watching your children explore the wonder of pumpkins.
 
In our house, baking soda and vinegar/lemon juice reactions are a huge draw.  The kids can NEVER get enough of the fizzing and exploding.  They love watching the differences in the reactions, as well, as playing in the goop.  I decided to add the wonder of fizz to the fun of pumpkins.  Such a hit!
 
We started out by mixing baking soda, food coloring, and a little bit of water in a bowl. 
We mixed until the consistency was firm and packed like a snowball.  This one needed a little more baking soda.  Notice that it is pretty watery.
We just kept adding baking soda, until we had the perfect pumpkins.  We made a batch of orange baking soda and green baking soda to make our pumpkin patch.
The kids had a ball shaping their pumpkins.  They used so much great mathematical and scientific language, while creating the pumpkins.  We discussed liquids, solids, larger, smaller, taller, shorter, and so much more.  It provides a gold mine of language opportunities.
We created our pumpkin patch in our homemade sensory table.  This is an awesome, portable table that is easy to transport and to store when not in use.  You can see the directions here.
The kids also talked about the life cycle of pumpkins.  You can see that they created pumpkins that are still green.  We were able to talk about how the pumpkins progress, as they grow.
Next, we got out the vinegar and lemon juice.  I had some fun ketchup and mustard squirters, so we filled them up with the liquid.  Yellow was lemon juice and red was vinegar.
Here is a reaction to the lemon juice.  The kids loved describing the bubbles that were produced.  You could definitely create a Venn diagram to chart the differences and similarities in the two reactions.
Here is a reaction to the vinegar.
As the exploration went on, they poured larger amounts of the liquids on the pumpkins to see a larger reaction.
Here they are pouring vinegar through a funnel into the middle of the pumpkin.
  I provided a variety of tools and the kids came up with their own experiments.  Ones that I had not even thought of trying. 
  This made for a huge set of bubbles and the fizzing even came back up through the funnel.
 I would definitely recommend trying your own pumpkin patch fizz!  Every step of this activity was enjoyable and created so many opportunities for cross-curriculum exploration.  I have so many ideas for the next time that we try this experiment!!
Even better is all the sensory fun!
We also tried played with my Pumpkins Interactive Play Dough Mats.  Great for differentiating needs in math!  Get your copy here.
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Pumpkins-Interactive-PlayDough-Mats-Counting-Centers-and-Games-Printables-898700
We used the play dough mats in a variety of ways.  They used play dough to form the numeral and create pumpkins to match the same number on the mat.
 Here, we used pumpkin manipulatives and dry erase markers to do the same thing.  The student drew ten circles on the mat and then covered each with a pumpkin manipulative.  It allowed her to use one-to-one correspondence to match the numeral 10.
 There are cards included in the pack that have numerals, addition sentences, and ten frames.  Here, the student drew a card and represented the addition sentence with two colored sets of pumpkins.  Then, they used a dry erase marker to record the answer on the mat.  I use this as a partner game.  One partner draws a card and represents the equation or number of objects.  The other partner double checks their work.  Then, they switch.
 Here are a few of the fun printables that are included in this pack.  Students will read the numeral and draw the appropriate number of pumpkins on the hay stack.
 There are a bunch of differentiated worksheets that allow students to trace and fill in the numbers 1-10, depending on their ability.
 In “Hit The Hay”, students count the pumpkins on the hay bales and write the matching numeral in the box.
 Look for more pumpkin activities in the next few days!!  I have some amazing games from Crayons, Cuties & Kindergarten that I can’t wait to share!!
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