THIS WINNING LESSON PLAN WAS SUBMITTED BY:

GRADE LEVEL

TOTAL BUDGET

2-5

1MONTH

$900

Math PosterProjectThe poster project, by teaching how to represent mathproblems and concepts in multiple ways, is helpingstudents on the path from novice to expert mathproblem solvers!

Andy HarperSilver Lake Elementary School12815 Bothell Everett Highway, Everett, WA. 98208

Curriculum/State Standards• Students will express

mathematical ideas usingmathematical language, models,charts, tables, graphs, andsymbols.

• Students will explain or describemathematical information for thepurpose of informing orpersuading.

• From the state Connectionsprocess standards: Students canrepresent information in multipleways.

• Students can use previouslylearned information in newcontexts.

• Students can recognizemathematics in everydaysituations.

OverviewAlthough the idea of making theposters is quite exciting andmotivating, it is important to realizethat students’ skills in presentingmath ideas in a compelling visualfashion is a growth area for manyof them. First, they need a lot ofwork on the math concepts, andthey also need to understand manydifferent ways of approaching amath idea. Next, they need specifictraining in design concepts, so thatthey can be successful in communi-

cating their math ideas visually.The poster project is just one smallstep to begin to address the hugequestion of how we effectivelyintegrate families and parents in thecircle of schools and classrooms.

Objectives• The students will communicate

math concepts in a visual way.• The students will make

connections between differentareas in math, and between mathand real-life situations.

MaterialsWith students helping to photo-graph, digital cameras are anobvious choice. Students take manymore pictures than you will finallyprint, and this is great reason to godigital. Here again, the firm yetpatient teacher can encourage whilehelping students to develop acritical eye.

Ink cartridges are expensive, andyou go though more than you mightthink, especially when you areprinting photos big enough to fit ona poster. For a project of any size,you should figure at least $200.00for color ink, and around $100.00for QUALITY photo paper.

Continued on the back . . .

“Math Poster Project” project continued . . .

Readiness ActivityProject activities focused onstudents working on multiplerepresentations for a given mathtopic. In fractions, for instance, welooked at: pie graphs, block graphs,arrays, and discrete models (onethird of a group of twelvepeople, for instance).

Strategies/ActivitiesAs a group, we then discussedwhich models would make themost compelling additions to ourposter. Then students in smallgroups were assigned to make theirpart. This way, we could work onthree or four component parts at thesame time. Most of the photochores went to the teacher, at leaston the editing and printing end.

EvaluationStudents evaluated the posters in afairly straight-forward way. Theygave compliments to each groupfor something they liked about theirwork and also offered one sugges-tion for improvement.