I love, love, love Math Work Stations! (freebie)

Where were you this morning? I saw a lot of familiar bloggers along the Blog Swap and Hop. Wasn't it fabulous? I found useful freebies, new blogs, and just enjoyed reading what other bloggers are up to. I told myself I'd stay off my computer for a while when I was finished hopping around, but I got the creative bug and made some things to go in my jungle/animal print themed classroom next year. 

The first is for Math Work Stations. People, if you haven't read this yet, you may want to. Last year was my 15th year teaching (11 years of that in 1st grade) and this was one of the best things I've ever introduced to my classroom. In our district, or in all of California (I'm not sure), were supposed to have 15 minutes of "math intervention." Work Stations were perfect for this. I used them at the start of math time and kids did them while I pulled a small group. Depending on what I needed to do with my group they may have switched and done 2 work stations, but this was rare. Often the group I pulled were students I thought would struggle with the lesson. My thought was to intervene before students had trouble rather than after. So I pre-taught and had the kids do some of the problems on the math worksheet. When I taught the lesson to the whole class I could see little light bulbs appear over the heads of the students who'd been in my group. Well not really. But you know what I mean. And they'd smile. I could see their confidence building. And they were much more successful every day.

If you want to read more about Math Work Stations, I found a lot of good information on Mrs. Parker's blog

Warning: once you start, you'll probably have a new project on your hands. I mean I love, love, LOVE math work stations!

Here is a picture of the tubs I used for Math Work Stations and some of my earliest work stations.

How can you get the cute stars in the pictures? Graphics by The 3AM Teacher
http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/The-3am-Teacher
http://the3amteacher.blogspot.com/

So to get ready for my jungle theme this year, I made some labels with numbers 1-12. The animals with numbers will go on the front of each tub and the larger numbers will go around the room so students know where to take their activity. If they'll work for you, just click on the picture and you should be able to download them. Just please leave a little note if you do.

Both sets of numbers are in the same document,

The numbers will also go in the pocket I use to keep track of which stations are being done each day. I put each students name on a card and slip that in next to the number of the station they'll be doing that day. At the bottom of the chart I put "Work with Teacher" and put names there as needed. I change theme daily. One things I did was duplicate some of the stations so I didn't have to create or teach so many games. Sometimes station 1 was the same as station 6 but the kids didn't seem to mind.

I'm curious, what do you do for "intervention" with your struggling math students? Leave me a note, I'd love to hear.