Winter Math Activities To Decorate Your Classroom

Over the years, you've sent me some great photos of your classrooms, from your math word walls to your Matholution pennants, and I have enjoyed every one. It's so fun seeing how the same printables can be arranged in so many different ways.

This post is a holiday celebration of teachers' creativity. I would have never thought to make Christmas trees out of math pennants! But you all did and these photos all blew me away. The effort, the colors, the care that went into creating the displays, everything. I am so thankful that teachers like you are in the classroom.

So let's get into the photos! I have been waiting a year to share these because I couldn't quite get it together last Christmas to write this post.

Ms. Evans sent this photo of her classroom math Christmas tree made from these order of operations pennants. I never would have thought to do this, and this is probably one of the most creative uses of math pennants I have seen.

Instagrammer @dilek816 sent this photo of her classroom door Christmas tree made with the same order of operations pennants.

Linear Equations Ornaments on a Classroom Christmas Tree

Ms. Kelsey also made a classroom Christmas tree. Hers is decorated with linear equations ornaments. 

Linear Equations Ornaments on a Classroom Christmas Tree

I believe that a little coloring in the classroom never hurt anyone. Ms. Kelsey's students took such care in coloring their ornaments. I think this was time well spent, especially around the holidays, which can be a time of high-anxiety for some kids (and teachers).

Linear Equations Ornaments bulletin board display

Ms. Henry sent this photo of her classroom bulletin board made with the same linear equations ornaments. 

Fractions holiday ornaments Christmas tree display

When I saw this fractions ornaments tree created by Ms. Covacha-Rothe on her classroom door! Wow! Such a happy display. The bottom is made from a set of integers pennants.

Holiday math ornaments decorate a classroom Christmas tree

Ms. Wickham's little Christmas tree is so cute. Her students added more math ornaments after this photo was taken. Are those real candy canes? I saw pickle flavored candy canes the other day and wasn't sure if I was intrigued, grossed out or a little of both.

Holiday math ornaments on a classroom door display

Ms. Coyer also used math ornaments to decorate the Christmas tree she made on her classroom door. 

Holiday Math Ornaments

My first apartment was in a basement. It was a little dark, so I had painted a window that looked out onto a range of mountains. Ms. Felton's window of a beautiful blue sky reminds me of my old painting. Here she has decorated it with snowflake math pennants and decorated her festive Christmas tree with linear equations ornaments. 

Ms. Dyer's Skeleton Functions Posters with Santa hats

I had to add these skeleton posters in here. 

Mrs. Hamilton's Skeleton Functions Posters dressed for winter

Ms. Dyer and Mrs. Hamilton added winter gear onto their functions skeleton posters to keep them going through another season. Maybe some pink hearts to bring them through Valentine's Day? 

Winter holiday lantern

Though it has no math on it, this winter holiday lantern is a way to bring the holidays into your classroom with a little coloring. Images include a Christmas tree, crescent moon and star of Islam, a dreidel, the candles of Kwanzaa and a Diwali lantern.

I absolutely love our Visual Math Facebook group. Teacher Janelle Cora transformed my printable holiday lantern into a pixel art activity and shared it with everyone in the group! 

You can grab a copy of this pixel art activity here: Holiday Pixel Lantern - Janelle Cora. 

Proportional Relationships Snowflake Pennants

Students find the equations of proportional relationships in this graphing snowflake pennant.

Graphing Linear Equations Ornaments

Students graph linear equations in the different forms in this set of linear equations ornaments.

All of my winter holiday math activities can be found here on TpT: 

HOLIDAY MATH

Links to ornaments in post:

Linear Equations Ornaments

Solving Equations Ornaments

Coordinate Points Snowflake Pennants

Proportional Relationships Snowflakes

Fractions Ornaments

Multiplication Ornaments

All winter holiday math ornaments can be found here: 

HOLIDAY MATH

Free math resource library

Scaffolded consumer math curriculum for building financial literacy

How do I file a tax return? What is a credit score? How much of my paycheck will be taken out in taxes? How much rent can I afford? What's an APR?

Finding consumer math curriculum materials can be a challenge. When I taught the course there was no curriculum, and it took me a lot of time to piece it together for my students. After years milling over the idea of building a printable, comprehensive consumer math curriculum to make teaching the course easy, I am SO EXCITED to say that I now have one available on my website.

This consumer math curriculum is an approachable guide to building financial literacy for teens. The curriculum includes a student book, accompanying student notebook sheets for building an interactive notebook, a teacher's book, projector notes to shine on the board, editable quizzes and all answer keys.

Here is a short video overview of what is included in the curriculum:

Topics covered: 

• Wants vs. needs
• Checks and registers
• Wages and salary
• Bank accounts
• Budgets
• Electronic banking and credit cards
• Credit score
• Discounts and coupons
• Sales tax and tip
• Percent change
• Unit price
• Income taxes*
• Car loans
• Mortgages
• Student loans
• Investing 

*The income taxes unit will be updated each year to reflect changes to that year's U.S. Form 1040. You will receive an email when the curriculum is ready for re-download. Re-downloads are free. 

Files included: 

• Printable student book (174 pages) 
• Printable teacher’s book (178 pages) 
• Printable student notebook sheets (105 half sheets)
• Projector notes (these match the student notebook sheets) 
• Editable quizzes for each unit (16 quizzes in PowerPoint) 
• All answer keys 

Details: 

The student book is a reference that includes vocabulary, examples and questions for students to answer. You can choose to print the entire student book at once or each unit at a time for student packets or their binders. Both formats are included so that you can easily print the whole book at once or one unit at a time.

The student notebook sheets are half-sheets designed for an interactive notebook. The sheets provide space for students to answer the questions posed in the book, and also include additional analysis questions. Students paste these notebook sheets into a composition notebook, which then becomes their own personal finance reference.

The teacher’s book and student notebook sheets answer key include all answers to all questions presented in the student book and the extra analysis questions on the student notebook sheets. Inside the teacher’s book are links to a Google folder of warm-ups and to a new consumer math teacher Facebook group.

The projector notes match the student notebook sheets so that you can complete notes along with your students on the board.

The quizzes are completely editable in PowerPoint. You can print the quizzes just as you would any document. Quiz answer keys are included for all quizzes.

FAQs: 

Who's this curriculum for? 

I wrote this consumer math curriculum for high school students not taking precalculus or calculus their senior year and who may have mild to moderate disabilities in math and/or reading. These are the students I taught when teaching consumer math and who I feel will benefit most from this curriculum. 

Can it work for younger students? 

If your students have already been introduced to percents, this consumer math curriculum may work for them. However, I do feel that high school seniors will be most invested in learning the material. 

Is it for a semester or for the year? 

This curriculum does not contain activities outside of the student notebook sheets, so can possibly be completed in one semester if it is used alone. 

How many licenses do I need? 

The curriculum is licensed for 1 single teacher to use with his or her students year after year. 

Is it available on TpT? 

The consumer math curriculum is only available on my website.

Do you have a list of standards? 

This curriculum covers the following National Standards for Personal Financial Education: 

Earning Income: wages and salary, gross pay, exact net pay, approximating net pay, pay schedules, tips, earning interest, retirement savings, 401(K) employer matching, filing income taxes, tax deductions, wage theft 

Spending: budgeting, keeping a register, comparing unit prices, sales tax, discounts, coupons 

Saving: savings, checking, money market accounts, CDs, simple interest, compound interest, pre- and post-tax retirement accounts 

Investing: risk vs. reward, stock market, bonds, retirement accounts, diversifying

Credit: credit card interest, credit card choices, credit score, credit report, minimum payments, APRs, down payments, car loans, mortgages, amortization schedules, student loan interest, student loan choices, deferment, forbearance, capitalizing interest 

Do you have a printout that I can give to my administration for approval? 

Yes. You can find a printout here for your administrator. 

Do you accept school purchase orders?

Yes. You can find that information here. Or you can send me an email to shana@scaffoldedmath.com.

This consumer math curriculum will make teaching the course easy for you and enjoyable for your students. Consumer math is such a fun and important course to teach, and I hope that your students thoroughly enjoy building their financial literacy with you! Please send me an email to shana@scaffoldedmath.com if you have any questions.

The consumer math curriculum is available for download here. 

Consumer Math Curriculum download

Geometric transformations in the coordinate plane with a hole punch

Last week, I wrote a post about using a hole punch to find function inverses in the coordinate plane. A few people asked on Facebook if the process would also work for geometric reflections, and it absolutely does! 

In this post I share an easy, hands-on method for demonstrating reflections and rotations of geometric shapes and their coordinates in the coordinate plane. The video included in the post covers reflecting over the x-axis, over the y-axis and over the line y = x. This same method will work for reflecting over any line of symmetry in the coordinate plane, even linear equations. I then share an idea for showing geometric rotations with a hole punch.

Numberless Quadratics Activity

"But Miss, these word problems don't have any numbers!"

"You're right! They're numberless word problems!"

How to find inverse functions with a hole punch

Are your algebra or algebra 2 students learning how to find inverse functions? Here's how to make the process of finding function inverses easy, visual and hands-on-- with a hole punch! This same process can also be used for reflecting any graph or geometric shape over the x-axis, y-axis, y = x or any other line of symmetry on the coordinate plane.

What the heck are fraction exponents?

Fractional exponents (a.k.a. rational exponents) are a little weird. They force us to think backwards, to ask, "What number multiplied by itself yields the base?" If this questions sounds familiar, it's because we ask the same question when figuring out square roots (and other roots). Rational exponents are just another, calculator-friendly way of expressing roots.