Picture Graphs game

Pictorial Graphs
================
Try this game to test your understanding of Picture Graphs. This would be fun!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/ks2bitesize/maths/data/interpreting_data/play.shtml

Shapes and sizes

Shapes and sizes -
Test your understanding here in this exercise.
http://www.ixl.com/math/practice/grade-2-identify-planar-and-solid-shapes

Fraction and Maths

Fractions:
============

Please look at this URL relating to fractions to deepen your understanding on Fractions.

http://www.kidsolr.com/math/fractions.html

Fraction Circle:
Free resource:
http://math.about.com/library/fractioncircles.pdf

Fraction Game:
http://www.mrnussbaum.com/pizza_game/index.html
This game is on pizza, and should be very interesting! :)


Fraction Practice:
http://www.ixl.com/math/practice/grade-2-halves-thirds-and-fourths
http://www.ixl.com/math/practice/grade-2-identify-the-fraction
http://www.ixl.com/math/practice/grade-2-fractions-parts-of-a-group
(more exercises available from this website)

Division

Division:
What is division?  This video best depicts what we are going to do the coming week. :)
1) http://khanexercises.appspot.com/video?v=MTzTqvzWzm8

Tell the time in half hour intervals

Some free exercises where you can practise telling the time:(based on P2 syllabus on the half-hour intervals)
http://www.math-drills.com/measurement/telling_time_half_hours_001.pdf
http://www.math-drills.com/measurement/telling_time_half_hours_002.pdf
http://www.math-drills.com/measurement/telling_time_half_hours_003.pdf
http://www.math-drills.com/measurement/telling_time_half_hours_004.pdf
http://www.math-drills.com/measurement/telling_time_half_hours_005.pdf

Homework for July 13th

Today's H/W: Tuesday 13 Jul
====================

1) MDPW KWL and researching of suitable graphics for the lesson.
2) Maths - WB Pg 59 - 62 (Comparing 2 or 3 amounts of money). Parents who are reading this, please read the post:
http://2drmps.blogspot.com/2010/04/my-favourite-subject-mathematics.html on the part on how we can make comparison of money easier.
3) Ad-hoc - optional (Journalizing on the Jotter Book)
4) English Stellar Worksheets - My Best Pet (Pg 1,2, 10 - 11)

Money - Little Relaxation Corner

Lesson on Money -

A poem/song on Money:
(sing to the tune of 10-Little-Indians)

One little,two little, three little 10-cents,
Four little,five little ,six little 10-cents,
Seven little,eight little,nine little 10-cents,
Ten 10-cents make 1 dollar. 

Let's try to sing this song in class today.

A poem which I have found from the Internet about Money:  (I have since edited it to be more relevant to our dollars and cents. The original URL is : http://www.theteacherscorner.net/thematicunits/poem2.php)

Don't ask dad___he never has any.
Grandma's purse has a dollar and a fifty-cent,
Mom has a five, but the car needs gas.
Here's a dirty fifty-cents someone found in the grass.
Checked all our pockets__nothing but sweets.
Piggy bank,piggy bank, here I come!

Mathematics - Time

Time and Money

==============

Good day to all.

We are going to start with these 2 topics when we come back this coming Monday.

For now, the starter would be Time. Please refer to this URL on how we can tell the time.

Singing Song as a warm-up:

My Grandfather's Clock

========================

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3tlIMJ9bK0

Telling Time: 

==============

http://www.youtube.com/user/EnglishChannelOnline#p/u/0/3icBxO6Wjz0

First lesson on how we can tell time. 

http://www.abclearningtime.com/a410.htm

Saying and telling time yourself

http://www.mathsisfun.com/time-clocks-analog-digital.html
Telling time

These 2 URLs would be very useful for the upcoming lessons.

Game for telling time: www.bgfl.org/bgfl/custom/resources_ftp/client_ftp/ks2/maths/time/index.htm
(pls try out these games to test your knowledge and understanding. Be sure to choose the first 2 options)

Cheers and enjoy the last few days of school holidays.

Mdm Chan

A tribute to Mum - Happy Mother Day

There are many ways to improve Maths and English.


Let me share through a story of how my foundation for Maths was created.

It all started with a passionate mum who was concerned with her daughter's well being in school. Being a KS (Kiasu – i.e. not wanting to fall behind attitude) mum, she would ask around for her friends' advice on how to ensure that the grades are all within the 90+ range.

I guess this strikes a familiar chord with many parents out there? In fact, I would be doing that too as my child approaches 4, or 5 in a few years time.

However, just to stay where my original purpose was: A good foundation in Mathematics starts at P1. Not at P5 and P6 where new concepts are being taught, and it's quite late to start those foundation all over again.

And when I refer to foundation, I am saying about the basics 4 operators. It took me years to master these 4 operators (mentally). Yes, I mean mentally. Not using your fingers and/or toes, but utilitising the capacity of your human brain.

Do you know when a human being dies, the percentage of the human brain being used is usually less than 1%? Our brain just work in an amazing manner.

To be quick in thinking, you simply need to start doing and learning more Maths sums EVERYDAY.

Yes, I may be extreme in my thinking, but that was how I got started.

Everyday, without fail, when I was out shopping with my mum, she always test me on Maths. (e.g. she would bring out the multiplication tables and test me as and when there are some slag time. On the bus, she would test me with some sums? If I got it wrong, or I used more than 10 seconds to solve the sum, she would tell me the answer. But more importantly, it's the technique she would share with me on how to get the multiplication sum correctly.

If that is her way of showing love, well, that was how I was “trained” in Maths. And subsequently, my younger brother is also trained in the similar manner.

Only that, I had progressed up onto another level. This time round, while doing groceries shopping, I was tasked to calculate which bottle's size would make a better deal. Let me illustrate an example. A 250 ml of milk costs $0.75(or 75 cents) in the NTUC. The larger version which is 1000 ml (or 1 litre) would cost $2.85. So, given the options, which one is a better deal? The challenge was not only to solve this sum, but to solve it within half a minute. That was my challenge. I used to calculate “exactly” the cost and try to inform my mum the calculation.

Later, I realised it was very time consuming as there were many 5 cents or worse, it could end up with 3 or 4 cents. How to do multiplication for hundreds times 4? That was something not taught to me, especially when I was only 7 years old. In fact, chronologically, I was only 6 years when I started my P1 education. Hence, my mum was very worried. She was afraid that I was 1 year behind all others. Well, she hid that fact well. Luckily, I was quite 'bright' after her intensive training.

The tip of calculation fast (in that above scenario) was through estimation. Unless you have memorised 75 x 4 = 300, and 300 – 285 = 15 cents discount, there is no way you would have known the difference in split seconds. That took me a hard way of knowing. (and without any proper training for those Xin Suan or Zhu Suan). By the way, I came from a not-well-to-do family.

However, I prospered under both my mum and dad's tutelage. Dad would pepped me on story telling. If anything, I was geared and prepared for story telling since P1. All through P1 to P6, I was always involved in story telling competitions. (not a story a day, but a competition which is quite stressed as I had to prepare my story and memorise it before hand. And those expressions and the correct way of saying it.

Oooooh, those days could be a real torture. I hated English story telling competition as I was communicating in Chinese with my parents at home. I love reading those stories, but reciting and reading out aloud is another thing altogether.

Anyway, back to the main topic. To be good in Mathematics or (anything else), you need the interest (it would be better if you have the passion). It is only through passion that can last you through the journey.

I do not know HOW you can find that passion. For me, Maths is my passion. I used to be crazy about Maths. Did you know, whenever I got less than 100 for my Maths in P1 and P2, I would be quite upset. Well, my average scores were 96%, but somehow that was not good enough.

As I move up to P3, and P4, I average from 90 to 69. There were a lot of adjustments as I was introduced into What is x? And using x to solve the problem. Yeah, I was 10 when I was told of this strange foreign concept....

Just to be fair, I had my share of being lazy, and getting as low as 67 for my final year of Maths paper in P5. However, during that year, I was heavily involved in band. I was training everyday for at least 3 hours. The band was disbanded when I was in P5. There were no new blood to take over the group. I was very sad during that period of time. I remembered the last time we had a performance was Speech Day (the final day of school). As usual, my band was involved, and after the final last performance, the whole bunch of us were feeling sad.

Well, the sentimental me would cry. I cannot remember if I did, but anyway, I recalled my Mum's scoldings. Those were real scoldings and a wake-up call from her. You see, I had YOY (Year-on-year reduction of 10 percentage points in my studies.) As at P5 final year, I was scoring 67% for my overall. For first time in history, I was placed in the 12th position in that entire class.

There were only 30 of us. But I have never ever scored >10th position, and this is not a joke. No matter how hard I played, I always ensure I am placed in the top 10 position. (or else, my mum would have my head on this. Not literally but figuratively.) She would start her constant nag, and the consequences of me not studying hard, and my “future”.

At the end of P5, I went to my cousin's place for tuition. I recalled my mum's paid her $100 every month. Well, instead of studying, I was playing. I would play on her keyboard. I was seriously into music, as I would transpose music from the recorder / from the band's pieces or whatever music pieces I could lay on, and self-taught myself on the keyboard. This can go on for a few hours. (not doing assesment on the assessment books where I was supposed to be). I was simply distracted, and simply love to learn things through Music. Please do remember that I was crazy about band, and I was quite sad about the disbandment of band in P5.

I had another wake-up call from my cousin. She could not control or manage me. And she issued me with a final warning. If I had continued the way I led, I would be an “nobody”. I know that parents nowadays may issue threats about being a road-sweeper. Well, you see, it came from a cousin who adores me as if I were her real sister, and she was really mad when she made those comments.

You see, I was her apple of her eyes (among all the young cousins she had), I was always the favourite. And I felt indignant when she said those things. I felt that I should never deserve the insult at all. Not at all.

Well, I guessed I must have been very fortunate. I came to learn of this tutor through my classmates' recommendation. 3 times a week, I went over to her place to learn Maths and English grammar. Science was self-taught, however, as my tutor was a graduate from Chinese school (Hua Choong), I was trained in Maths and Grammar as if it was a logical subject.

English grammar is nothing but just full of rules. Rules of what applies, and what does not apply. I seriously undertook that, I was given a challenge. That is to get into my dream school. However, that dream school was a GEP school for music. Under my love for my P5 teacher, she came from that girls' school. I was determined to get into that school. Just to show and prove that I could do it.

Yeah. Those who know me, I can be very persistent, stubborn in my ways. However, if you do not possess these qualities, how can you succeed in setting out the goals that you established. My goal was to get at least 240 for PSLE. Given my P5 results, I was scoring 217. That was at least another 10 percent points. YOY. It was not easy. If you read my earlier essay, you had realised, studying would get harder and harder. There were now more new concepts and stuff you need to learn.

Usually, students struggled with P6 because of more concepts, and trying to cope with whatever had been taught previously.

Luckily for me, during my Nov and Dec holidays (those 6 weeks of holidays), other people were playing non-stop. For me, it was my new journey of studying. I had never imagined myself studying non-stop during my school holidays. It was like 5 – 8 hours every weekday. I didn't really calculate the amount of time I had to spend. All I knew was

1)Go to popular bookshop, pick out the toughest Maths assessment book
2)Complete it. No questions asked.

Taking a deep breathe, that was a real challenge. My tutor, in fact, subsequently used my book for her teaching as she felt that it was a very good book. Today, this book has branched off into Maths Olympiad (in 3 series).

I cannot imagine myself doing Maths for at least 3 to 5 hours everyday. You see, I keep repeating. It has got to be passion, and the desire that I want to score an A star. Nothing less than an A star which kept me going.

There was the head prefect who was my neighbour. We motivated each other, as we would have each other for accompany we attended tuition together, and having snacks at Mountbatten House. The shop had closed when I was in Sec 1.

I just had that competitive streak. When this friend completed 1 exercise book on Maths, (which is 120 pages of that exercise book), I need to do better than her. Please do not ask me why. I just knew I had to be more hardworking, more diligent and asking questions in school at P6.

The journey at P6 was horrendous. I had a very good teacher who was very efficient in marking. She was also very efficient in teaching new concepts in Maths. Well, good for me, as my efforts in P5 school end holidays shown, and I was back into the 90% percentile. In fact, I always ask myself: Why didn't I get 100. It was no longer just “Oh, I got 90% only.” It was more like “Eh, why did I get 96 instead of 100?”

I always do a reflection of what went wrong. That is why, I asked my students to do a thorough self-reflection of themselves. It is through reflection that one learns what went wrong. You never know what is wrong. Till you figure and make the connections yourself. Not by others telling you what is right or wrong. As teachers, we always like to preach what is right and or wrong. However, this is this inner voice. The voice of conscience and logic which we need to develop (even if we are very young). And this has to be set right from the beginning. A good student exhibits not only good results, but there are core values which comes along with it.

Being humble.

Yes, you need to be humble even if you are very good. Do not brag about yourself, or your results as there will always be someone better than you. Yeah, I usually act stupid in front of others. However, that is to learn from others. And reinforcing whatever have been learned. I have this serious habit of not being a good listener. Well, to be successful in life, you need to learn how to listen.

Even in studying, you do not HEAR. As far as you can, you should learn how to listen. Listening is not only about the words that have been spoken out, but the body language, the tonality of how the speech has been delivered, and you deciphered it (in your brain, what is this person doing, why is she/he saying such a thing? What is the purpose? What can I learn out from it? Is this something, a good behaviour I should emulate, or something I should take note and NEVER ever copy this bad behaviour.) Sometimes, exposure is good so that you can differentiate for yourself what is bad, what is wrong, what is right or wrong?

There is no real correct or wrong. However, there is a set of internal principles or values which have been taught to us or inculcated since young.

I came from a neighbourhood school. There were the students who repeated P6 for 3 years; they were 15, and swearing was something very common. I learned that I should never use those words. (Although I have full awareness and understanding of those words in Hokkien). Yeah, I grew up with my grandparents who spoke only Hokkien to me, and we stayed in a 1-room rental flat along with my mum, younger brother, my grandparents and my uncle. It was a crampy place for 6 persons.

But we survived.

There is no moral of this story. Morals should be derived from the readers. Please go and decide for yourself what exactly are the morals that have been said within the stories, and what are the good things we should all learn from this.

To sum all up, if you want to learn about Maths and English, you MUST be passsionate about these 2 subjects.

How to develop the passion? Include them in your every day life. Not buy doing and redoing assessment books.

It's about learning through ALL senses, even when you are out of your books. I always enjoy a trip to NTUC, as there is where I practise my Maths. Yeah, the mental Maths I had to do, and get the rebates for NTUC members. 4% as a member, and linkpoints for a minimum purchase of $20. Also, comparing the prices of food which have been imbued inside my brain. Somehow, it's there. It is there for all of us,
we just need to connect the dots, and start this journey ourselves.

Cheers~

Happy Mother's Day for all mothers. I love my mum. I may squabble with her; and there are usually daily squabbles, but I love her for who she is. :)

The tribute for Mother's Day: I just want to thank her for being around with me. She has been my source of light when there is darkness, and a source of inspiration for me whenever I am not thinking right.

Well, mothers do age. So, please start cherishing your Mums and Dads. Alright, am signing out and stopping this post.

Happy Mother's Day!

My Favourite Subject - Mathematics

Writing by BC - My Favourite Subject

========================

This was received via E-mail from BC couple of minutes ago. Thanks!

Mathematics is my favourite subject in school. I love Mathematics because it is a very nice and fun subject. We use Mathematics in our everyday life be it in school or at home.

In school, we learn our Mathematics through calculating objects or things around us. We also learn it in quizzes, games or solving number problems.

When I play with my friends in school, we will use Mathematics too for example when playing basketball, we would need to count the number of times the ball that is being thrown into the net. When we are playing hide and seek, we count using numbers and there are many others games.

At home, I often play counting games with my little brother. I teach him how to count his fingers, toes and the toys. He loves it and he will always laugh. We have a great time learning Mathematics together.

Therefore, I think it is good for everyone to learn Mathematics.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Mdm Chan comment: Thanks BC for his article. That’s a great improvement from the previous one. I do believe that you must LOVE Maths and not be afraid of Maths.

To do well in something, it should always start with passion. If you do not have passion, it becomes a chore that you do.

Well, please do not treat Maths as a chore. Without Mathematics, our daily lives will never be the same. Think about the Maths that you are doing in your daily lives in school. For example, when you buy food from the canteen, you deal with money. You have to count the money and give the money to the canteen vendor.

However, if you move on from P1 to P2, you need to think about more things, what are the food that is cheaper than outside’s food? Have you ever compared the prices between outside school and what you are paying for in school? E.g. a bottle of 500 ml of ice-lemon tea cost $1 in the canteen. However, do you know that a 1500 ml of the same ice-lemon tea cost only $1.45 elsewhere in the NTUC supermarket? And wait, a 1500 ml of ice lemon tea is THREE times the 500 ml (remember that 5 x 3 = 15?) So, you are essentially paying $3 for three bottles of 500ml in school. (And that means you pay $3.00 - $1.45 = $1.55 more).

The difference may not be much to you. However, if you think about planning for a birthday party, that savings would be a lot more.

Cheers.

Thursday - What a Day

Thursday Night

=============

This is the first time I am writing from home.

Homework assigned:

There is no homework for today. However, please remember to bring along your small bag with your stationery (pencil box, highlighter, standard ruler) and a story book.

At the same time, there was a book given to some of the students from 2D. Please be reminded to bring that book. (This is part of the i-read programme)

Agenda / Stuff lined up for tomorrow: (hopefully I will manage to cover all the points)

=============================================================

1) Life in a Shell - final exercise

- Going through the exercise involving plural. I realized some of the students are having confusion again on nouns/verbs ending with "f", and "y"

E.g. butterfly == plural form is butterflies,

shelf -- plural form is shelves

2) Going through the Spelling words. (Surprisingly, the average marks for this week's Spelling is amazing! It's going downhill. I used to have PL and JM scoring full marks, but I do see some decreases for the past 2 weeks. KL failed his spelling test.)

3) Mental sums booklet - sums for the week - I would be doing final testing on tables 2 and 3 before moving to tables 4 and 5 next week. (I am very happy that almost 90% are scoring full marks (including my infamous RT) for this week's problems. Maybe they are getting too easy. However, I am very happy that most of the students are able to know their tables. Yet, there is the application of the multiplication which we have yet to explore.

I am holding back this area as we need to "memorise" the tables before moving onto the application and it is something which we should NOT rushed.

I should not overplan and do so much, but these are the key things that have been lined up.

Homework for Friday -

-----------------------

That should be a surprise, which comes tomorrow. I do see some students who are trying to foresee and do my 'next day' homework. Yet, the problem arises when they make more mistakes while rushing through it.

Anyway, that's all.

RQ and SS were absent today. I was quite sad without their absence, especially RQ since I know he is really good in speaking. He would have been a fantastic reader for the speech and drama performance.

Anyway, it's alright. To RQ if you are reading, please take good care of yourself. :)

SS and RQ, hope to see you in school tomorrow.

Regards,

Mdm Ivy Chan

Problem Solving - Math Khan Academy

Maths - Please watch this for problem solving -


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8-4mIiNtV3k

Memorising Tables(Maths)

I can never stress the importance of memorizing the multiplication tables again and again. Even with the daily mental sums that I have assigned the class, I still face some students with the same learning difficulties, that is, they do not know how to get those numbers memorized in their heads.

This is also another major headache for me as it is very important and efficient that they can get these numbers in their heads. You never know that having these numbers in their heads go a long way in aiding them in their work especially in the higher primary when they are exposed to a higher level of mathematics. It is never too early to start memorizing.

In fact, when they are much younger, they should have started with these rote-memorizing instead of suffering as they get older.

Why is it that when I have never encouraged blind memorizing but this is just too important that they should just remember it by heart. Well, I cannot explain more or say more, but these formulas are just so useful, and it would go a long way, and making you more sensitive towards numbers when you are familiar with them.

So, please start learning them now and ensure that you are certain that you do know your tables. The starting journey may be quite difficult but you should never give up.

As I have always mentioned in the class, never say Never! If you believe in yourself, you can do it. :)

E.g. if I can also memorise those tables since young, I am sure my students should also be able to do it!

Gambatte (work hard when translated from Japanese)

Mdm Chan