Primary
FREE!
Gifted and Talented
Collaborative Work
Early Finishers
Transition Times
Warm-Ups
Morning Work
By: Leah Popinski
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-Leah
2015 Leah Popinski
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Teacher Notes For:
Primary Make Them Think
This set of activities is for your fast finishers, morning work,
collaborative work, or whatever need you have in your
classroom when its time for a little extra math reasoning and
problem solving. There is both rigor and fun included to keep
your students engaged and challenged.
I included a beginning story to set context and establish a bit of
humor for your students. The two characters, Jute the Giraffe
and Thomas the Turtle have very different problem solving
styles which your students can relate to. The characters show
up from time to time on the activity pages to encourage and
keep your kids thinking even when the problems are tough to
solve.
Some of the problems may be quite difficult for students. We
all learn through struggles. While not letting your students
become overly frustrated, dont be too quick to jump in and help
them solve the problems. By asking clue questions such as:
Why do you think that?
What would happen if ?
How did you get ____?
Tell me your thinking steps.
you can help students think about their thinking and become
better problem solvers. They must also learn to persevere when
solving problems. By telling students answers or by being too
quick to directly answer their questions, we can take away
learning opportunities.
Wishing your students much fun and learning!
-Leah
Happy Mathing!
The Beginning
Jute the Giraffe and Thomas the
Turtle are the best of friends. They love
solving and creating problems together.
Thomas the Turtle knows that solving
problems and good thinking take time. He
just seems to know when things make sense
and are reasonable. Jute the Giraffe really
loves figuring things out, too, but sometimes
Jute just guesses without checking his
answers. Thomas explains things to Jute in a
logical way. Then Jute gets it. Thomas calls
this an Aha! moment.
Jute and Thomas hope you have many Aha!
moments as you solve the problems that
they have created for you.
Oh! And they also hope that your brain
grows and doesnt explode with their
challenges!
Happy problem
solving!!!
Name ___________________
Date __________________
Be Reasonable!
Read each group of sentences. Decide
which number in the number bank would
make sense in the blank.
Number
Bank
1. I am ____ years old. I have ____ pets.
My mom is ____ years old.
2
35
7
2. My birthday is the ____th of May. Last
year I got a lot of stickers for my
birthday. I got ____ and put ____ of them
in a sticker book.
120
37
5
3. My dad baked ____ cookies. My sister
ate ____ of them and there were ____
left.
36
7
29
There are ____ people in my class. There is
____ teacher. We go to lunch at ____1
oclock.
11
22
1
Thats not
reasonable!
Youre in 2nd
grade!
Leah Popinski 2015
Name ___________________
Date __________________
Animal Stories
Write a word problem about the animals below. Use
the numbers in your problem. Also use the word
fewer.
Leah Popinski 2015
Name ___________________
Date __________________
Number Shape Challenge
Put the same number in the same shape.
= 8
= ___
= 7
= ___
= 15
= ___
= 3
= ___
I think Im in
shape now.
Exercises for
your brain!
Leah Popinski 2015
Name ___________________
Date __________________
Try This:
If A + A = 4 then A = ?
2 of course!
Because if I replace each A in the equation
with a 2, it looks like
2 + 2 = 4 Hooray! That is a true
statement.
What if A + A = 10 ? What would A = ? Yes!
A = 5. Because if I replace each A with a 5,
the equation would be 5 + 5 = 10 and that is
a true statement.
Try these on your own:
A+A=6
A = _____
A+A=8
A = _____
A+A=2
A = _____
A + A += 12
A = _____
Leah Popinski 2015
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