Easter Egg Hunt!

So, last year I put an easter egg hunt together (complete with math problems). It was a lot of work, but
once it was done it was ready for years to come! I was a little hesitant on doing this in my classroom
because I’m not a fan of total chaos, but I came up with what I have to say is a BRILLIANT way to
conduct the game. It’s worked like a charm for 2 years now.

Here’s what I did:

I printed off some worksheets over LOTS of different skills. I labeled each question on each worksheet
with a different letter of the alphabet (A1, A2, B1, B2 etc) and made my key with the corresponding
letters and numbers. One note here, I wish I would have used completely different sounding letters-I
had C, D and E. Next time… Once I had the worksheets and keys made I laminated the worksheets
and cut the questions up. I then folded them and stuffed Easter eggs with the questions. I think I had
over 100 eggs.

Now for the fun part.

Before class, I put the eggs all over the perimeter of the room. Most were in plain sight but some were
less noticeable. I didn’t put any INSIDE cabinets or drawers because I didn’t want my students tearing
up my room. As they came into my class I told them to go straight to their seat and not to touch any of
the eggs. That peaked their interest.

Ahead of time, I made a list and divided my students into groups of 4 (I had some classes with a group
of 3 and some with a group of 5 but it all worked out). I called the names in each group and had them
gather together then pair off (those with odd numbers had to have one person work alone). I then told
them where to sit (a pair from team 1 sit here, team 2 here...etc) making sure the pairs were as far
away from each other as possible.

At the front of the room I had some Easter buckets numbered 1-5 (I had a class of 21 so I had 5 groups
of 4. Smaller classes would need less buckets.) I then ran through the rules of the game by choosing a
pair of students (I’ll call them Fred and Joe) and walking through the steps:

Both students have a piece of paper and pencil. FRED goes first and gets an egg. He brings it back to
the desk and opens it. They both write the question number (and letter) on their paper then both students
work together to determine the answer. Once they have an answer, they put the question back in the
egg, close it up and JOE brings the egg and his paper to me (I am standing in a centrally located area
next to a desk that has the buckets on it and a bag). If someone is already talking to me students form
a line. Joe tells me the question letter and number and after I have located the answer, he tells me his
answer. If he is correct, he puts his egg in his team’s bucket. If not, he puts it in the bag. He then finds
an egg, brings it to the desk where he and Fred answer the question. Then FRED brings the answer to
me and finds the next egg. At no time should both students be away from their desk-one at a time.

About 5-10 minutes before the bell rings we stop the game (those who have an egg at their desks are
allowed to finish answering their question) and I the eggs in the buckets. The team with the most eggs
get a prize (I gave 3 small pieces of candy to the winning team members, 2 to the 2nd place team
members and 1 to everyone else)

Things I stress:

One person is hunting eggs at a time.

ONE egg at a time is taken to the desk.

No pushing and shoving etc. to get to an egg.

Make sure you have the correct letter and number of the problem written down and speak clearly
when telling them to me.

Make sure you put your eggs in the correct bucket.

Anyone breaking any of the first 3 rules had to quit the game and do a worksheet.

Toward the end of the game you may run out of eggs. As long as there was one team with an egg I
told everyone to keep hunting (one from each pair). If no one could find any more I told them that they
had 2 minutes where BOTH team members could hunt but if one of them found an egg they went back
to their desk and worked on the problem. If no one had an egg after 2 minutes of everyone looking, the
game is called and the eggs are counted.

One of the great things about this game is that as soon as it’s over your ready for the next game. (If I
have back to back classes I let the first class hide the eggs for the next class-stressing the “not in
drawers” etc.). In minutes you’re ready for the next class. After the last class has played, just put all the
eggs in the bag and you’re ready for next year. Easy Peasy!

I just pulled this out today and my kids LOVED it, even with the math problems. They said it was
“surprisingly fun”. They answered around 20 correct questions per team (one team had 26!) as well as
all the questions they didn’t get correct, and they were disappointed when they ran out of eggs. I can
NEVER get them to work out that many math questions on a regular worksheet.

BTW you don’t HAVE to laminate the questions. It just makes them more durable so they can be used
over and over, and it deters the students from writing on the questions. Also, I prefer to “laminate” my
questions with clear contact paper. It seems to work better than the school laminating.

I hope you give it a try! It’s worth the effort.

Digital Breakouts!

Over the summer I discovered "Escape Rooms" and went so far as to put together an awesome escape room for my sons and their friends this summer. I planned to make some for my classroom, but just before the school year started I discovered Digital Escape Rooms! I've gone crazy!

If you want to see some examples of digital escape rooms you can find one here: Sample Digital Breakout There are some free ones available that people have made that cover different topics. I used them to see what was available and how to design a breakout. I thought they were a lot of fun but didn't quite cover the skills I wanted my students to cover, so....I made my own. We're getting ready for 6 weeks' tests so I made one over converting fractions to decimals and percents.

Springing an escape room on my kids was so much fun! I posted the link in Google Classroom and turned them loose. I let them sit next to a friend and collaborate with them but each one had to work on their own laptop. I told them that there would be a prize for the first team to breakout. Once they "Broke Out" I put them on an internet math game so they were too occupied to pass on the secrets to other teams.

The "Oh! I get it!", "That was fun!", "Oh rats! It's time to go!", and other comments throughout the class gave me a warm feeling inside! I also loved hearing kids explain to each other how to do the math involved and hearing the "Ahhh's".

If you want to try this in your class, I have a variety of no-prep already made digital breakouts over ratios, fractions, decimals and classifying numbers on my TeachersPayTeachers page. More will be added as the year goes on. They're just too much fun and so great for the kids! 

Get Them Involved!

I have to say, one of my biggest strengths as a teacher has been my pessimism. This has helped me to avoid multitudes of trouble. Whenever I'm planning a lesson, the first things that come to my mind are the ways things can go wrong, and then I set out to fix them before they go bad. Of course, I don't always think of everything, but for the most part, I've had some pretty successful activities in my classroom.

I'm always trying to think of ways to make sure EVERYONE is participating. I have to admit, I have some fantastic actors in my classroom. They seem to be listening with rapt attention to every word I say, but when it comes to putting the pencil to the paper...they don't have a clue. I've come up with a couple of ways to encourage my Oscar winners to to quit acting and actually participate:

Start the lawnmower...

Well, that's just one of them.... Each student has a piece of paper and pencil. I come up with the question and tell the students to write down their answer, keep it covered and stand up when they are through answering the question. Right away I notice my little actors looking around and trying to figure out how they can be someone who's standing up. After enough time for most of the students to answer, I call time and tell everyone to switch papers (or just show their paper to their neighbor) and then I work out the question on the board. Anyone who got the answer wrong sits down and those who remain standing do some kind of task. These might be hop 5 times, spin around 3 times, do your best touchdown dance, impersonate a water sprinkler, the latest dance move or start the lawnmower (it's a pull lawn mower and they have to do the sound effects). This is usually enough incentive to get some of my kids to pay attention so they know what they need to do in order to be able to participate.

Check 2, Help 1...

This one is my favorite. I came up with it a few years ago and have worked out the kinks so that it works wonders now (and my kids LOVE it).  It gives them a chance to talk with their friends, show what they know, and move around the room. Here's how it works:

I post a question and the kids work it out.  When they have the answer written on their paper they stand up and keep their answer covered. I usually wait for about 3 students to stand then I choose one and check their work. If it's wrong I just say, "No" and they sit down and try again. I go check another student. If it's correct, I say, "Check 2, help 1" then step back and watch. 

By this time, more students have started to stand up. The student who I just checked goes to 2 other students(one at a time) who are standing and CHECKS their work (they can only say, "Yes" or "No" and then they move on. No explaining.) They then find someone who is still working on the question (sitting) and they HELP them get to the correct answer.

As students who are standing get their work checked, they go out and check more students. This quickly gets everyone's work checked. After checking, they're spreading out helping kids who need help. All without me.

After each student has checked 2 and helped 1, they go back to their seat and sit down facing backwards (so they aren't confused with those who are sitting because they need help). If there aren't enough students left to be check or helped, the student just sits down facing backwards.

Many times I don't wait until everyone has the correct answer. I just call, "Time", everyone goes back to their seat or turns and faces the front and I quickly go over the question then post a new one.

Things I've had to stress:

We have a long talk on what "help" means...I tell them to be a teacher. I then remind them that most of the time when they need help, I don't tell them what to do, but I am mostly asking questions to lead them to the right answer. I also make it illegal for the "helping" student to write on the "helpees" paper.

Students may only interact with THREE people then they sit down.

If someone is already being checked or helped no one else can check or help them.

If someone is sitting, they cannot send the student who came to "help" them away. They may, however, say, "I don't need help." and continue working. The student who came to "help" must stay at the desk until the sitting student is finished working, then he looks over his work and tells him whether he's right or wrong. If he's right, that student gets up and starts checking. If he's wrong, the 2 students work it out together until he's right and can go check other student's work.

If the student I checked (first student) checks 2 people and both of them are wrong, everyone has to wait while he finds someone who is sitting and "helps" him to get to the correct answer.  That student then goes and checks 2 and helps one.

I tell my kids that as soon as I say, "Time", they are to stop what they are doing, sit down facing the front and get quiet or we will stop the activity. (I also tell them that if I see that they are playing and not doing things correctly this will also stop the activity). It only takes one time each year of me stopping in the middle of "Check 2 Help 1" and going straight to "Here's a worksheet since you aren't following directions". After that, they police each other and the activity runs extremely smoothly.

Those are a couple of my favorites in my bag of tricks. I'll be posting more soon.