Counting What's in a Mystery Box Lesson Plan

Counting What’s in a Mystery Box Lesson Plan

Grade Level and Unit: 1^st Grade, Investigations Session 2.3

Session and Description of Lesson Tasks: Students will count objects in Mystery Boxes and record their numbers. They will be working on working with a partner and checking to make sure they have the right answer.

Materials needed: Mystery boxes, worksheets, pencils.

Grouping Decisions: Students will work in pairs.

Learning goals/Objective(s) What are your core ideas for this lesson? What do you intend all students to know and understand? I want them to work on counting and finding a stategy to make sure their answer is correct. I want them to build on their skills of working with a partner.	Language Objectives? What language will you model during the lesson? What language do you expect to hear during student discourse? Together How many?
Standards: How do the learning goals relate to the standards? Massachusetts Mathematics Curriculum Frameworks: Grade One 1. NBT: Extend the counting sequence. 1.         Count to 120, starting at any number less than 120. In this range, read and write numerals and represent a number of objects with a written numeral.
Connect and Anticipate: In what ways does this lesson build on students’ previous knowledge? What student strategies and responses do you anticipate? What misconceptions and struggles might students have? This builds on their previous knowledge of numbers and counting skills. I anticipate them to use strategies like putting objects into groups, counting one by one, and rechecking their partners work. Some students may struggle with larger numbers and may get discouraged if their partner counts a different number than them. I want students to be able to overcome this challenge and figure out what the next step should be and not get stuck.
Focus Questions Consider what questions you will use to focus on students’ thinking to encourage sense-making and discourse. Launch: To introduce the activity/motivate students. What is a strategy I could use to count objects? How can I represent objects on my paper? How did I know if I counted correctly? How can you be a good partner? Explore: To assess students’ understanding and to advance their thinking as they work independently, in partners or small group How accurate is student’s counting? Did they make any errors? What did they use to show objects? Summary: To facilitate the analysis and synthesis of ideas shared at the end of the lesson Do students know what to write to represent a given quantity? How well did they work in partners?

Evidence: How will you know what students understand? What evidence will you collect? (If there is an exit task, what will be its focus to inform you instructional next steps?) I will be able to tell how well students did based on how accurate their counting skills were, if they made a mistake if they were able to correct it, looking at how they represented their objects on their worksheet, and how well they worked in partners.

Pitfalls and Solutions:

ELL: Students may count in their native language if that is easier. There will be no word writing so they should have no problem with the worksheet. I can read them the directions id necessary.

Special Ed. These students will be given a box with fewer objects so it is easier for them to count. They will also be paired with a student who is more capable doing this activity.