Thursday, February 10, 2011

100th Day & The Wolf's Chicken Stew


We had a 2-hour delay on the 100th day of school.  We didn't get to do everything I planned, but I did have time to make these chicks to use with a math activity.  The idea was adapted from a Mailbox Magazine (Dec. 2007-08) activity.

I read the story, The Wolf's Chicken Stew by Keiko Kasza.  I divided my class in half (well 5 and 4).  While the other half of my class went with another teacher to do a descriptive writing activity, my group skip counted by 5's.  As the students fed their chicks 5 cookies, the group counted by 5's.  After we counted 100 cookies, the students counted how many cookies each chick had.  I had to participate with the second group.  The second group counted by 10's.  When I did this activity with a team member's class, we counted by 10's.  I asked them, "If all 8 chicks get 10 cookies, how many will be left?"  One student was quick to tell me, "20."  I then asked what we should do with the left-overs.  They said to count by 2's until they were all gone.  When they counted their cookies, they realized that some chicks had more cookies than the others.  We decided that 100 cookies could not be shared equally between 8 chicks.