Math Rotations: Math Centers

Warning: Information Overload! I will have to say that Math Centers took me the longest out of any of these to wrap my head around, to practice with my kiddos, and the one that I am still working on perfecting. I will share what I have done so far, but please-pretty-please share your tips and strategies below!!

Math Centers

If you're like me, my typical math class was set up with Teacher Time and Lesson Work, just in a whole-group setting, so making those more small-group oriented was easy and delightful!

Math Centers were what always hung me up when it came to logistics, time management, work habits, building independence with my students, and on and on and on!!

So, I decided when I was going to take the plunge into Math Rotations, to over-prep Math Centers to death, because I was pretty sure that if the wheels were going to come off the bus, it would be when kids were in this center. By the way, is there such a thing as over-prepping? Oh well ;)

The first thing I did was buy these lovely shelves from Joann's during one of their big sales with free shipping. I love these darlings so much, the other set is for Word Work Centers. They are just delightful and keep the flow going in the class, so that was the start of keeping management issues at bay.

My next step was to think about purposeful center activities that would do several things:

• Keep students engaged for 15-20 minutes
• Require little prep-work on my end-- they had to last longer than a week, and preferably several, so variety was important, too
• Easy directions for my kids to understand
• Cover standards we just studied or ones that could always use some extra review
• Cute and high-interest :) :)

Here's why some of those are important-- I, like all of you, are tired and pooped by the end of each week and the idea of making new centers all of the time was just not going to happen.

** Rule #1: In order for this whole Math Rotations idea to be successful, I needed it to be as easy on me as possible so I would be inspired to keep going. 

Drowning in printing, laminating, cutting, and copying specifically for these centers each week was not going to be the answer and is my quickest road to dropping the whole thing.

For me, what worked was the idea of seasons and I therefore created my Wintertime Math Centers {Spring, Summer and Fall are coming soon} to address all of my needs above and be cute and fun for third graders. These activities make up the meat & potatoes of our Math Centers work.

Click the picture to be taken to my TpT Store

I also wanted to incorporate some things we already do, so using our Word Work Centers seemed like a great idea. I did want them to practice different words, however-- not that there's anything wrong with more independent spelling word practice, I just wanted to shake things up a bit for them, so I instead use 3rd Grade CCSS-Aligned Math Vocabulary Cards on a binder ring:

I printed these front-back so it could save paper since there are over 100 terms

I put all 100+ on a binder ring (printed on front & back and laminated), or you could put out just the ones that address what you are studying and/or what you have already studied.... up to you :)

Now, my kids can practice Place Value Spelling or How Much is Your Word Worth? with new and interesting vocabulary drawn from our math lessons and get additional practice with math vocabulary all year long... can't beat that :)

How do I keep track of student work?

I keep this all organized in a very similar way to Word Work: A Bingo Board :)

At the beginning of each seasonal unit, I will put a Math Center Bingo Board on the top and staple all of the center work behind it for a "Math Centers Packet" they will use over the course of the next however many weeks you want. It's nice to be able to offer students the choice to go back and forth between center activity and Bingo activity to keep their engagement up.

My expectation/requirement is that, by the due date, they have one bingo and all of the center work complete-- any additional Bingos and/or Bingo squares are a bonus.

The items on the Bingo board are:

• Place Value Spelling
• How Much is Your Word Worth?
• Letter Tiles Spelling
• Dice Games (includes Roll & Cover)
• Math Boggle

For Math Boggle, I simply laminated some die-cut circles and will write numbers with dry erase markers that  reflect the concept(s) we are working on. Kids will then choose two numbers that are next to each other (up-down,left-right, and/or diagonal) and solve with the circled operation on the sign. They record their work on a mini-dry erase board that I will check and give them a signature for:

For Dice Games, I use FANTASTIC freebies from Pitner's Potpourri and my own Multiplication Roll & Covers and these games are my kids' favorite!! I think because this is also one of the activities that require them to work with a partner, which is always fun :) To cut down on noise and lost dice, I use the dollar store mini-containers to keep the dice in:

Whew, that was a lot! There are definitely ideas in my head already for Part 2, 3, and maybe even 4. Hopefully, this starter post got you thinking of how you could make Math Centers work for you in your own unique classroom.

I am offering an *EDITABLE* Bingo Board in my TpT Store if you are interested-- it is a fully-editable PDF that will allow you to tweak the Math Centers Bingo to fit your own needs and your own choices in class. Check it out HERE if you're interested.

Thanks so much for sticking with me through this post! Let me know if you have any questions!