Ninja Notes

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Professional Learning

Plotting on the Cartesian Plane During Math Class

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If you are looking for ways to teach the Cartesian plane, ordered pairs or coordinates in your elementary math class, come check out this post full of practical ideas.

The Cartesian plane was named after the mathematician René Descartes. This is now an outcome in the Alberta Mathematics Curriculum and somehow we made it through all our university math classes without needing that information.

The plane is a fundamental tool that can represent relationships between two variables. Most of that goes right over the heads of elementary students, but if you talk to them about the game Battleship, most realize they’ve already been using the Cartesian plane. Come learn how we teach the quadrants and coordinates.

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Last Minute Substitute Teacher Ideas When Plans Fall Through

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If you are a substitute teacher and the plans have fallen through, you need this post full of ideas. We cannot recommend planning for the worst more, but this post will get you through the start of day until things get sorted out. Come read it!

Have you been hired as a substitute teacher at the last minute? Are there no substitute teacher plans in place or you can’t find them? We pulled together this list of activities you can use to get your day sorted out. Most of the activities are designed for upper elementary, but you might be able to adapt them for your group of students.

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How to Build Math Fact Fluency in Your Classroom

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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.

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How to Unfold Geometry: Books to Shape Your Unit

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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.

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How to Fix Your Forced Copy Google Glitches

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Are you having trouble with Google glitches because your forced copy links aren't working? Come read through our list of possible solutions when the link you received doesn't work.

If you have been using a forced copy to receive Google files, you may have noticed a glitch that can cause problems. To be clear, when we allow for a copy of our Google files to be made in your drive, we should never have to share or give you access. We’ve already done that step to automate it. However, there have been lots of problems with Google glitches lately so we gathered up all the knowledge we could find online and put it in an easy-to-use format so that you can get your files as quickly as possible. Many teacher authors like ourselves use these forced copy links because sharing folders isn’t possible (yet).

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Rich Financial Literacy Lessons to Save For Your Students

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Financial literacy is so much more than counting money, but things change regularly so it can be difficult to keep up. We put together all the information teachers need to add these lessons to their upper elementary classroom. Talk about saving, investing, budgeting and so much more with these activities and all the the background information needed for teachers.

Gone are the days when parents would teach their kids how to use their money. In fact, many adults don’t know how to use their own money. According to a recent poll in Canada, seven of ten adults consider themselves financially literate. However, nearly 65% of Canadians admit to being in debt or living from one paycheck to another. So, what does it really mean to be financially literate, and what does this have to do with elementary education?

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