• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Ninja Notes

Let us help you teach like a ninja!

  • Engaging Lessons
  • Teaching Strategies
  • Classroom Tips
  • Free Resources
  • Shop
  • Contact Us
    • Privacy Policy

Teaching Strategies

How to Teach Decimals Place Value

by BrainNinjasWP

Are you looking for ways to help your students master decimal place value? We put together our best activities to help teach, review, practice and assess decimals place value in your upper elementary math class.

For some students, place value comes second nature, but for others, it can be very challenging. Once you add decimals into the mix, it can become downright confusing. Come check out some of the strategies we use to help students master decimals place value.

[Read more…] about How to Teach Decimals Place Value

Filed Under: Teaching Strategies Tagged With: decimal place value, decimals, interactive math notebooks, Interactive Notebooks, Math, math errors, Math Lessons, math units, Math Worksheets, Mathematics, place value, Professional Learning, Teachers Pay Teachers, Worksheets

How to Teach Integers With Positive and Negative Numbers

by BrainNinjasWP

Are you looking for ways to teach positive and negative numbers as part of your integers lessons? We spent time finding activities that can be used to teach, reinforce, practice, review and assess integers in your upper elementary classroom.

In upper elementary, we’re asked to teach positive and negative numbers. This is when we start to refer to numbers as integers, which means reframing math vocabulary for our students. Come learn how we teach integers in our upper elementary math class.

[Read more…] about How to Teach Integers With Positive and Negative Numbers

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons, Teaching Strategies Tagged With: Integers, interactive math notebooks, Interactive Notebooks, Math, Math Worksheets, Number Line, number sense, Positive and Negative Numbers, Teachers Pay Teachers, Worksheets

How to Build Math Fact Fluency in Your Classroom

by BrainNinjasWP

Getting students to practice their times tables can be difficult. There just isn't time to practice everyday. We wanted to make students more aware of their growth, so we started practicing our math facts and then had students graph their progress. It also encouraged learning about different types of graphs. Come get our math fact fluency graphs and learn how we use these in math class to ecnourage accuracy.

With so many things to do in math class each day, it’s almost impossible to help our students build fluency in math facts because there simply isn’t enough time. Timed drills have been proven to be unsuccessful for the majority of students because rather than testing mathematical knowledge, they test how fast a student thinks or writes. So, we were looking for a way to help students practice their math fact fluency without time constraints. That’s how we came up with our math fact fluency graphs.

[Read more…] about How to Build Math Fact Fluency in Your Classroom

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons, Teaching Strategies Tagged With: graphing, long division, Math, math fact fluency, math facts, Math Lessons, math manipulatives, Multiplication, Multiplication Strategies, Professional Learning, Teachers Pay Teachers

How to Unfold Geometry: Books to Shape Your Unit

by BrainNinjasWP

Picture books are a great way to inspire your students in a visual way. Geometry has a lot of new vocabulary which can be challenging for students, so use books to help students learn new words and concepts. Come check out this list of geometry books and questions you can use while reading them with your upper elementary students.

Are you using geometry books in your math classes? Why not? Even simple books can help students visualize concepts. Even books that might be considered “baby books” can be used in your upper elementary math. There is more than one way to use a book. Come read how we do it.

[Read more…] about How to Unfold Geometry: Books to Shape Your Unit

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons, Teaching Strategies Tagged With: Book Recommendations, books, geometry, interactive math notebooks, Math, Math Lessons, math manipulatives, Math Worksheets, Mathematics, Professional Learning, Teachers Pay Teachers

How to Demystify Math With These 7 Algebra Activities

by BrainNinjasWP

If you are avoiding algebra activities in your math class, we're here to help. We have several lessons and activities that can take the mystery out of your introductory algebra lessons and get you feelling confident about teaching it. We've got activities for patterns and algebra that you can use with any resources! Come have a read today!

When we hear that we have to do algebra activities, the fear is real. Algebra is this haunting reminder of high school. When I was becoming a teacher, I didn’t want my negative experiences with math to influence how I taught it or, more importantly, how my students learned it.

In university, I was put in a “special” math class designed for education students who needed to refine their math skills. Truthfully, it was for us creatives who didn’t take enough math during high school and university. At first, I was scared of the class, but as the class progressed, I realized how lucky I was to be there. Not only did I get over my fear of math, I learned how to break down math concepts in so many different ways that I could teach it to any student. Come learn some of the ways to break down introductory algebra with these algebra activities.

[Read more…] about How to Demystify Math With These 7 Algebra Activities

Filed Under: Engaging Lessons, Teaching Strategies Tagged With: Algebra, First Year Teachers, first-year teachers, interactive math notebooks, Math, math error analysis, math errors, Math Lessons, math manipulatives, Math Worksheets, Mathematics, new service teacher, new teacher, new teachers, Pattern Lessons, Patterns

15 Ways to Engage Readers During Your Read-Aloud

by BrainNinjasWP

If your administration thinks reading aloud to your students is a waste of time, you need to read this post full of ways to engage readers and teach your language arts outcomes. It goes far beyond listening skills. Come get a whole bunch of ideas on how to get the most out of your read aloud.

It seems that there is less and less time for reading aloud to your students, but if you use that read-aloud to engage your readers, you can teach so many different skills. Kids (and adults) of all ages love to be read to. If that weren’t the case, there wouldn’t be a thriving industry of audiobooks.

Administrators want teachers to focus their time on literacy and numeracy. Things like read-alouds seem like “entertainment,” but there is so much value in reading aloud to children. Come learn how we turn every read-aloud into a lesson (without our students even knowing it).

[Read more…] about 15 Ways to Engage Readers During Your Read-Aloud

Filed Under: Teaching Strategies Tagged With: books, First Year Teachers, first-year teachers, fluency, Guided Reading, Guided Reading Instruction, Listening Skills, new service teacher, new teacher, new teachers, read aloud, Reading, Reading Activities, reading comprehension, reading strategies

« Previous Page
Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Most Recent

  • Teaching your students to calculate area can be a challenge, but we've pulled together great ideas to help introduce, practice, review and assess how students measure area.
    How to Teach Students to Measure Area
    The biggest mistake students often make...
  • Measuring the volume of objects can be tricky for some students, but we put together our best ideas to get you started, help you review and even assess how your students are learning. Come read the whole post today!
    The Cubic Quest: How to Teach Volume
    Some students struggle with the concept...
  • Teaching students to measure capacity can be a fun and engaging hands-on activity for your upper elementary math class. Come learn about some of the different ways we help our students learn to measure capacity in metric units.
    Five Amazing Capacity Quests to Enliven Your Classroom
    Teaching students how to calculate capacity...

Before Footer

Looking for something?

Footer

Copyright © 2025 · Wellness Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in

This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.AcceptReject Read More
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
Non-necessary
Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
SAVE & ACCEPT