Math Work Stations Chp 4

First of all, thank you Fran Kramer for all the wonderful ideas and downloads you so graciously shared with us. (A link to Fran's blog Kindergrarten Crayons will be at the end of this post).You out did yourself with your post. I have taken all my ink cartridges to be refilled so I can get to work planning how to use all your great activities. I am going to share some pattern block activities that I use at the beginning of the year to help develop number concept. Using pattern blocks gives the children lots of hands on experience with pattern blocks that really helps when moving into geometry.

 Making Designs with Pattern Blocks
This activity can be used with number cards, I usually laminate 5X7 index cards with a number written in the upper right hand corner and have students make designs with each number. As an assessment, I will write a number on an index card or a quarter sheet of white construction paper, give students paper pattern blocks and have them make a design. There is a great pattern block website The Math Toy Box that the children can also use for making pattern block creations. 

 I also use premade pattern block task cards and have students make the designs then sort and count the patterns blocks and record their answers. You can also have students graph the number of pattern blocks. Another activity (game) is to have students spin for pattern blocks to make the pattern.  I will make a spinner and place it in this post a little later this week. I have used the books Patternables by Susan Sehi-Smith (less than $10.00) to make my task cards but I recently found a great website Prekinders.com. She has tons of patterns block patterns, in color and black and white. I particularly like her patterns, because there are patterns with smaller numbers of pattern blocks, great for differentiation. If you don't have the ellison die cuts for pattern blocks, I found a website where you can download blackline masters and run them on matching colored paper. 

I also have pattern block templates so students can trace designs. I bought one template and used large cool whip lids to make the rest. 

Here's a list of websites that will give you lots of pattern block fun for your classroom:

Pattern blocks pdf file
 

Prekinders.com

Pattern block templates 

 Pattern Block Activities

Here are 2 sheets to grab

Click here to download. (the circle in the right hand corner will correspond to the pattern block template they choose to make; it makes it quite easy to see if they counted correctly)

 

Here's the pattern block graph to download.

Once again, a great big thank you goes out to my new BFF Fran Kramer and all the other wonderfully talented and creative teachers I have met through this book study. I also want to thank Deedee Wills for putting this book study together.

 

http://kindergartencrayons.blogspot.com