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Playlist: Bookmarks

Squiggles Collection 1

Everyone starts with the same squiggle. No two drawings end up the same. What do you see?

New Uses For A Chair

So, what can a chair be used for other than, you know, sitting in?

New Uses For A Pencil

So, what can a pencil be used for other than writing and drawing?

New Uses For An Aluminum Can

So, what CAN a CAN be used for other than storing liquids?

Pig Pen Cipher (Codes Part 2)

Let’s encode some secret messages with a cipher that was actually used during the American Civil War!

Categorize and Re-Categorize Animals

Put these animals into groups. Then do it again. Then… do it one more time. How does re-re-grouping the same creatures reveal new patterns and give new insights?

Fizz Buzz: A Counting and Divisibility Game

Ready for a tricky counting and divisibility game?

The 8th Wonder of the World Tournament

Which of these eight wonders deserves to become the Eighth Wonder of the World!?

Tournament of Ancient Inventions

Which of these inventions of the ancient world is most influential? Least useful today? Most taken-for-granted?

Habitable Planets and Moons Tournament

Which object in the solar system is most habitable?

New Uses for a Paperclip

So what are some new ways to use a paperclip?

Tournament of Presidents

So who was the strangest of these eight presidents?

Writing Differentiated Lesson Objectives

For Teachers

My early lessons didn’t even have objectives, let alone good objectives! Here’s how to build four-part, differentiated lesson objectives.

A Lunar Survival Mission

A favorite of mine! This task is delightfully complex and ambiguous, forcing students to make choices without enough information and with no right answer. How will they survive on the moon for three days?

Complex Task: Academic Tournaments

For Teachers

Who would win in the Tournament of Least Useful Geometric Shapes or Bravest Shakespearean Characters? Create an academic tournament and watch your students’ brains sweat!

Word Ladder: Two to Six (6-steps)

COLD to COOL. BAND to SING. Change one letter at a time — can you find the path?

Self Portraits Part One: Line Drawings

Anyone, yes anyone, can create a (somewhat) realistic self-portrait using these steps. Anyone!

Not Like The Others: Natural Disasters

Four natural disasters. One doesn’t belong. But which one? That depends on your argument.

Subtraction: 3 Digits Minus 2 Digits (Multiple Solutions)

Typical practice problems don’t move students up Bloom’s Taxonomy. With this framework, you’ll see kids stop and really think about how to approach multi-digit subtraction.

SCAMPER: Scaffolding Creativity

Asking students to “think creatively” won’t get you far. They won’t know how to start, they’ll get stuck with simple ideas, or they’ll just go completely wild. SCAMPER is a tool for scaffolding the process of creativity.

Disneyland Parking Structure Math Project

Your students will use estimation strategies to figure out how many parking spots are there in the parking structure at Disneyland? And you bet I reveal the real answer!

Numerator or Denominator: Which has more power in a fraction?

What do you do with students who already get their fraction operations? Give them a contrived project about recipes or pizza slices? Make them solve annoyingly hard practice problems? Please. Here, we get students thinking in a whole new way, pondering which has more power, the numerator or denominator.

Paragraphs: Systems of Sentences

Blow up a paragraph into individual sentences. Now reassemble it. The clues hiding in each sentence will surprise you.

Bulls and Cows

How quickly can you break the numeric code?

Calculators, Patterns, and Multiplying By Decimals

Before teaching students the procedure for multiplying with decimals, how much can they intuitively glean from a structured play session with calculators?

Grouping Quadrilaterals In A Hierarchy

Can we classify quadrilaterals like we classify living things?

Deducing the Area of Triangles

Using patterns, students try to deduce where that area formula came from.

Upgrading Compare and Contrast Writing

Upgrade compare and contrast writing with just a couple of key words.

Finding The Volume of Laptops

How has the volume of laptops changed over time? You know you want to check out how huge those first versions were!

What Does it Cost to Fill a Car with Other Liquids

Is gas actually that expensive? What if we filled a car up with… orange juice?

Fractals: Sierpinski’s Triangle

What if this triangle pattern just kept repeating… forever!?

Showing A Character’s Trait

We tell students to ‘show, not tell’ — but that advice is useless until they experience the difference. This lesson makes it click.

Improving Presentations 1: Watching The Greats

Get better at giving presentations by studying the greats!

Visualizing Fraction Multiplication

What does it look like to multiply fractions?

Fraction Puzzlers: Add and Subtract Fractions To Reach A Number

You only have six digits to form three fractions. Can you combine them to get to 0?

Analyze Character Change with Depth and Complexity

Your students will use Depth and Complexity to note how a character’s main trait changes across a story.

A Visual Guide To Dividing By Fractions

Have you ever wondered what it looks like to divide by a fraction, man?

Creating A Realistic Flower and Pollinator

Your students will create a new flower, designed to attract a specific pollinator.

Inductively Analyze Website Reliability

For Teachers

Rather than giving students rules to apply to websites, let them analyze websites to create rules.

Discovering Pi With Sticky Notes

Pi is mysterious and strange! Why not let students discover it on their own?

Drawing Natural Curves Like Andy Goldsworthy

Andy Goldsworthy turns leaves and stones into art. Your students will learn to draw his signature natural curves — then build on them.

Ways to Start a Sentence – Level 2

We’ll show students how to add more variety to their writing by starting sentences with a reason, a prepositional phrase, and a simile.

Ways to Start a Sentence – Level 1

‘Add more variety!’ teachers say. But how? This lesson gives students actual techniques instead of vague advice.

Greekymon

Rather than just memorizing word parts, students will use those word parts to create four possible products.

The Game of 100

Who can get to 100 first in this simple, but delightful, math game?

Furnishing A Hotel

Design and furnish hotel rooms on a budget. Real math, real constraints, real decisions. Then pitch your hotel to investors.

A Grid-Based Fraction Project

You’ve got 60 spaces on a grid to create an amusement park, a house, a farm, or whatever you’d like. Divide it into seven pieces, order it by size, combine into two halves, and more in this fraction project.

An Inductive Exploration Of Geometry

For Teachers

With inductive thinking, students will work from parts to whole, discovering big ideas along the way!

Writing Clear Directions

Can you write directions so clear that a group of kids can put a toy together with no illustrations?

New Uses for Everyday Things

For Teachers

Here’s how Joelle Trayers gets even her youngest students ready to think in unexpected ways.

Response to Lit: An Inductive Approach

For Teachers

Here’s how one teacher uses inductive thinking to help students respond to literature.

Add Layers To Direct Instruction

For Teachers

Take direction instruction beyond a monotonous practice of the same skill over and over.