Bridges Blog Archive for Grade 5

Middle school math teacher Andrew Stadel uses visuals and technology during daily warm-ups to help students practice estimation. On his website, Estimation 180, he shares this work with other educators and students. Students see a problem posed on a photo or brief video and enter their estimates, confidence levels, and reasoning.

Know Your Quadrilaterals, a YouTube song/video by Dave Nelson, shows a variety of quadrilaterals as part of a family tree, different yet related. Shapes include: kite, trapezoid, parallelogram, square, rectangle, and rhombus. Bridges students may enjoy viewing this upbeat video during Unit 3 in Grades 3 and 5 and Unit 4 in Grade 4.

New and updated supplements are available to support Bridges users in grades 4 and 5 as they implement the Common Core State Standards. You'll find:

Grade 4
A9 Adding & Subtracting Fractions (updated)
A10 Multiplying Whole Numbers by Fractions (new)
B2 Multiplication Comparisons & Equations (new)

In a blog entry, Bad Maths in the Real World, Richard Byrne recounts a visit to McDonalds where apple pies were advertised, two for 99 cents.

Ready for a little rap? Fourth and fifth grade Bridges students will enjoy the beat of this Prime Numbers Rap as they explore related content in Unit 1 lessons (grade 4: session 11-12, grade 5: sessions 9, 11, 12.) Thank you to Jill Widmar for the rap recommendation.

The Lion's Share: A Tale of Halving Cake and Eating It, Too, a 2009 publication by Matthew McElligott, provides an entertaining look at the concepts of fractions and doubling. In the story, an ant is invited to the lion king's dinner party. The other guests demonstrate horrendous table manners. When the king passes the cake, each animal takes half of the cake he is passed.

On the MLC website, you'll find resources authored by Eugene Maier, past president and cofounder of The Math Learning Center, and professor emeritus of mathematical sciences at Portland State University. One treasure, A Play on Numbers, consists of a sequence of scenes with related commentary.