So with this end-of-year activity, I considered these two perspectives. Younger kids are longing for guidance on what to expect in their new classrooms and from their new teachers and older kids are excited to give their best advice.
Showing posts with label class decor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label class decor. Show all posts
"My Advice to Next Year's Students" end of school activity
So with this end-of-year activity, I considered these two perspectives. Younger kids are longing for guidance on what to expect in their new classrooms and from their new teachers and older kids are excited to give their best advice.
Absolutely Free Math Bulletin Board Printables
In this post are a bunch of free math printables, including dancing skeletons, approximate size posters and a message from Spiderman, that will brighten up your math classroom while sending students the message that math is cool, fun and for everyone!
How to Enlarge a PDF into a Multi-Page Poster for FREE! 3 Simple Steps
When I first started hanging math word walls on my classroom bulletin boards, I figured out a super roundabout way to enlarge a pdf to print on multiple pages. There were multiple conversions involved and the whole thing took entirely too long. So I enlarged a few things, put them up in my classroom and moved on.
But I recently revisited this whole free poster thing because there had to be an easier way. And by "revisiting", I mean I asked on Facebook and got an answer in 3.2 seconds from a super helpful teacher Ms. Potter. And yes, I had been doing things the hard way!
I could very well be the very last person on Earth to know how to do this but like we tell students, "Always ask your question because guaranteed there is someone else in the room who is wondering the same thing." So if you are like me, here are 3 super-simple steps to enlarge a pdf into a multi-page poster.
How to enlarge a pdf to print on multiple pages
Step 1:
The first thing to do is download (from a desktop computer) Adobe Acrobat Reader DC. It's free.
The first thing to do is download (from a desktop computer) Adobe Acrobat Reader DC. It's free.
After downloading, here are the steps to uninstall the programs that come along with the PDF reader:
Click the start menu
Type control panel
Under programs, click uninstall programs
Sort the table by "installed on"
Click to uninstall the Adobe photo reader (if it's there)
Click to uninstall McAffee security (you don't need this)
Step 2:
Right click on your pdf file and choose "open with Adobe".
Right click on your pdf file and choose "open with Adobe".
Step 3:
Once your file is open, choose "print". This will bring up the settings.
Once your file is open, choose "print". This will bring up the settings.
By choosing "current page" and "Poster" my printer magically enlarged this free How to Be a Math Person poster to 4 pages.
*You can experiment with Tile Scale (right underneath the Size button) to get the number of pages you want your poster to be. For this poster, 100% worked. When I printed my Quadratic Keywords poster (below), I had to change this setting to 185%. You can keep increasing this % to make a giant poster!
hint: You may need to click out of the Tile Scale box and into another box in order for your set tile scale to take. This is what happens when I enlarge PDFs.
There is some trimming to do, but this is OK because the overlap makes the poster easy to tape together.
Once I lined everything up, I put small pieces of tape on the edges to hold things in place while I used larger pieces of tape to secure everything.
And here's the finished product! Once the poster is taped and on the wall, the seams are barely noticeable.
I hope this post has been helpful and helps you make lots of fun posters for your math classroom decor! Please always email if any settings give you trouble and I'll be happy to help.
I enlarged this addition reference from a new 3rd grade math word wall addition reference using the same directions.
Here it is all taped together. At this point I want to enlarge everything! So simple and it's so nice to be able to do it from home.
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How to Eliminate Glare on a Laminated Classroom Word Wall
That glare from a shiny, laminated word wall is killer. Between the florescent lights and the windows, there's always somewhere in the room where the glare coming off the lamination blocks sight of the references underneath it.
Math Classroom Word Wall Setup Teacher Photos
In this post are a ton of math classroom word wall teacher photos. Thank you so, so, so much for sending these incredible photos of your math word walls and math classroom setups to me. I have enjoyed looking at each one and am thankful you took the time out of your busy days to send the photos, and have allowed me to share them in this post. Above is a collage Mr. Morrone sent of his math word wall.
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| Ms. Malm's geometry word wall |
Math classroom decoration ideas
I've written a lot about the benefits of hanging student work and math word walls. But I didn't always have my classroom bulletin boards covered. It wasn't until a few years into my teaching career that I started decorating my classroom with vocabulary references, posters and student work.
This post is a collection of math classroom decoration ideas, some from my own classroom, some printables I've made for teachers, and photos that teachers have sent to me of their own math classrooms.
This How to be a Math Person poster reminds students that we are all Math People. It's a free download here.
The math bulletin board borders are from a pack of "mathy" math bulletin board borders that come in a few different variations.
There was a positive change in my classroom once I started hanging student work and math word wall references. The above photo is from my former classroom where I taught small group algebra 2, geometry and consumer math. I was able to track down the dancing functions posters and linked them here.
Here is a photo of Ms. Estrada's 6th grade math word wall coming together:
And a photo of Ms. Nara's middle school math word wall:
A classroom math word wall helps students work more independently, and makes it easy to move students past confusion while keeping the rest of the class on track. Every math word wall for 2nd grade through algebra 2 and financial literacy is in this big math word wall bundle (and available separately):
Student work makes great classroom décor. Even my seniors like having their hard work displayed! Here is a photo of our classroom fridge where students hang their graded papers:
Most of the time my juniors and seniors choose to hang their papers on our classroom fridge instead of bringing them home. It is motivating for them to see their work displayed, and allows me on tough days to point to examples of their work when they had been successful. The fridge letters are a free download here.
This Peter Parker Loves Math Spiderman poster is part of my blog's free math resource library.
This parallel lines poster was originally made from cut paper, and I later digitized it into a PDF to be a printable poster. Here I enlarged into a 4-page poster on my computer. The original is a one-pager and can be given to students as a coloring page and reference for their notebooks.
This angle pairs poster can also be given to students as a coloring page for them to then use as a reference in their notebooks.
I want my students to believe they can achieve no matter how much they have struggled in the past with math. This no need to be a genius poster reminds students that staying curious and persistent will lead to success in math.
A good friend sent this photo of her students' math person self-portraits that she added to her classroom cabinet door as decor. I love the equations students added to their portraits, and how unique each is.
Math pennants are another fun way to integrate student work with math classroom decorations. Here is a photo teacher Yvette shares of her students' math pennants. I love how they look displayed against the window.
Ms. Collins shared this photo or her students' math pennants displayed on the wall outside of her classroom.
This success iceberg is one of my favorite classroom posters of all time. It was drawn by Sylvia Duckworth. There are many other versions of this motif, but hers is my favorite.
At the beginning of the school year as students enter your classroom for the first time, this Welcome, Math Person! poster is a reminder that we are all math people.
This Practice Makes Better poster reminds students that perfect is overrated. Great things happen when we work hard, get better and stop worrying about being perfect. Making mistakes is important and the way we grow, especially in math class. I hope this poster helps students remember this.
To me, math confidence is everything. When students are confident, they can push through that tough math topic or at least be more willing to try. That confidence can be tough to build and comes from more than just classroom décor. But I do believe that the decorations we hang in our classrooms can help.
This order of operations mobile is part of my blog's free math resource library.
This collection of data and statistics is part of a 6th grade math word wall.
Teachers have sent so many great photos of their classroom math word walls, and seeing them all has made me so happy. This one was sent by Ms. DePalma. These are parts from an algebra word wall.
Ms. Ody shared this photo of her math word wall. The title was made with this set of math word wall letters:
Mr. Urzua shared a photo of his math word wall on Instagram. I love the black background.
Ms. Woodworth brought her math classroom décor outside and hung hundreds of matholution math pennants in her school's courtyard. The matholution pennant is a free math pennant download here.
I've made over 100 math pennants, with a bunch for the holidays. They're fun activities that cover math topics and then double as student-created math classroom décor.
Shelby sent this photo of her beautiful display of Valentine's Day math pennants.
This back to school math pennant with a Golden Spiral theme helps students get to know each other at the beginning of the year. It comes with a short lesson on the Golden Ratio and optional glyph directions for students to color based on get-to-know-you questions.
My friend Karrie from Mrs. E Teaches Math sent this photo of her students' back to school math pennants. How about that wood paneling?
This "I'm so glad you're here" math classroom poster welcomes students as they enter your classroom.
If you're into Halloween and teach algebra or algebra 2, this is a free set of 12 dancing skeleton math posters for the different algebraic functions. It's a fun set to display in the fall.
Ms. Page sent this photo with little Santa hats on her skeleton functions to extend their life through the winter holidays!
This place value wall reference is part of my blog's free math resource library.
This order of operations math pennant is a free activity that doubles as math classroom décor. There's another linked to it for younger students. Students evaluate the expression on their pennant, then hang it in your classroom as décor. Even my seniors loved seeing their work displayed!
Word problems are a challenge, so I made a word problem strategies bulletin board for solving any math word problem, from elementary to middle to high school. Not shown in the photo is a title that reads "Word Problems" that was a suggested addition.
How do you like to decorate your classroom walls? Do you believe less is better, go all out or are you somewhere in the middle?
> Browse all math classroom décor
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