by Keith Cochran | Jun 27, 2022 |
I recently read Digging Deeper: Making Number Talks Matter Even More by Ruth Parker and Cathy Humphreys. (This book is a follow up to their book Making Number Talks Matter.) Both books are brilliantly written and describe the authors’ process and thinking about what I...
by Keith Cochran | Jan 22, 2019 |
Question: Why was the work with percents taken out of the 5th grade curriculum in the 3rd edition? Answer: In the 1st and 2nd editions of Investigations, there was a unit (Name that Portion and What’s That Portion?) that included lessons that connected what 5th...
by Keith Cochran | Jun 25, 2018 |
As hard as it is to believe, it’s already that time of year again—summer is here. Some of you have already finished the school year and are in vacation mode. Others of you, particularly our friends in the Northeast (making up for all those snow days) are likely...
by Keith Cochran | Apr 2, 2018 |
Have you ever been teaching (or leading professional development) and asked a really good question only to be met with silence? We all have teacher moves in our back pocket for situations like this—maybe do a turn and talk, ask the student if they’d like to call on...
by Keith Cochran | Mar 19, 2018 |
On a recent site visit, I was observing in a fourth grade classroom. The teacher started the lesson (Unit 6, Session 2.1) by writing “3/2″ on the board and asking students to name the fraction. Most said “three halves” although one or two said “two...
by Keith Cochran | Dec 11, 2017 |
On a recent visit to a school in a small city in the Midwest, Karen and I joined a class of 5th graders as they learned a game in Unit 3 called Roll Around the Clock. In the previous session, students used a clock to find and name fractions and equivalent fractions....
by Keith Cochran | Sep 18, 2017 |
Picture it! J.M. Ullom ES, Las Vegas, NV, 5th grade classroom, 1992-1993. (Yes, there are schools in Las Vegas!) It was my 11th year of teaching. I’d taught 7th and 8th grade on two Native American Nations in Arizona, and had been teaching 5th grade in Las Vegas for...
