Sorting

Math principles are always around us. For example, last week, the children had fun playing with lots of little dinosaurs. Mrs. Magee told the children that in order for the dinosaurs to "fight" each other, they needed to be separated into groups by color so each person could have one color group.

Here's how it all worked out. Notice the piles of dinosaurs and some extras that didn't seem to fit any other group. Guess what? It's division with remainders!

Now I must confess, this was completely spontaneous on Mrs. Magee's part. She suggested this sorting activity simply to get a sad child engaged in play. Nowhere in my lesson plans did it say that we would work on division. This fantastic opportunity was just a whim!

We plan for many math concepts, but more importantly, we capitalize on the teachable moments.