Snow Delays, Coordinate Planes, No Projector. OH MY!

January was a bit rough on the school days. We were cancelled 7 days, were able to make up one day, and had several 2 hour delays. Lessons have been very sporadic to say the least.

Last week's lesson: Coordinate Planes 

Day 1: Definitions and a Foldable
We started with some definitions and a foldable for our Interactive Math Notebooks. I used a free foldable from To The Square Inch. Of course I forgot to take a picture of our notebook. :) I also typed out the definitions this time instead of having the kids copy notes.

Many of my kids take a long to copy notes and then they are not legible. Giving struggling students a copy of notes is a great strategy to utilize.



Day 2: Finish Foldable with an Activity
We needed to finish the inside of our foldable, but I lost the use of my projector. Evidently it was overheating due to the heat vents. I wish the heat would find its way down to us instead of my projector. Needless to say, I was starting to panic. How in the world was I going to teach and practice coordinate planes without my projector? I calmed down and went "old school". Yep, I drew my own coordinate planes.


I found some magnetic tape in my desk and created magnets for the points (construction paper circles stamped with a design and glued to a piece of magnet) and labels.


The kids were able to go to the board to label the x and y axis, the origin, and practice plotting points.


I really think the lesson turned out better than if I had used Plan A with the projector.

Day 3: Game with Task Cards
TPT Seller Alicia Lykins graciously gave me a set of her task cards: 6th Grade Coordinate Plane Task Cards. These were perfect for my coordinate plane lesson. The cards have a nice variety of tasks (plotting points, creating polygons, fill-in the blank, naming quadrants, naming ordered pairs, etc).

I used this set of task cards for my game. Yes, task cards can be used for games!! I split the kids into 2 teams, placed the cards upside-down on an empty desk, and had one person from each team choose a card. The kids went to the board and answered the questions (they plotted points, named quadrants, plotted polygons, listed ordered pairs, etc). I used the card numbers for the number of points the team received. It worked great, and they enjoyed the class!




Yes, I am surviving the snow days and 2 hour delays. I do have my projector functioning again, but sometimes it is nice to go "old school". I think the lessons turned out great since the students were engaged and learning. I've never used task cards for a game before but will definitely be using them again for games in the future! Thanks Alicia for the cards!!!