Frequently Asked Questions

What grade do you teach?
Tabitha teaches 3rd grade, and Chloe taught 3rd grade before going back to school full-time for a doctoral degree in August 2013. 

How long have you been teaching?
Tabitha just finished her fourth year of teaching. Chloe taught for 4 years and has completed her first year toward her doctorate degree.  

Do you have a Teachers Pay Teachers Store? 
Yes! You can find many of our templates and resources here. Our store is Math Workshop Adventures.

How long does it take to plan each week's math lessons?
Well, at the beginning of the year, it could take us four hours if we had to create several resources outside of the curriculum.  If the curriculum had several resources available, then planning and prep usually took an hour.  


How much of the district's curriculum, Everyday Math, do you use?
Fortunately, our principal gave us the go-ahead to use the curriculum (Everyday Math) to support this year's learning but not as the only resource.

When we mapped out the year we first considered which 3rd grade skills (from the Missouri Grade Level Expectations) were foundational. We plugged those skills into the year's map first. Then we tried to plan the rest of the year in the order of EM.

We typically taught an EM lesson on Monday for whole-class instruction during the time that we created an anchor chart over the week's skill. If that particular skill's unit contained multiple math journal pages and/or home links to support the skill, then we assigned those. Why create new materials when we already had several resources in EM? The EM curriculum does not contain content for every GLE that we are to teach. Therefore, we did quite a bit of searching and creating for those skills--properties of addition & multiplication, congruent figures, multiplication drill, analyzing and interpreting 4 different types of graphs.

In summary, we used the curriculum as much as we could, but we certainly relied on our creativity and other available resources (i.e. Super Teacher, Smart Exchange, Brainpop!, etc.)

This coming year (2014-2015) we have adopted a new math curriculum, MyMath. We look forward to updating throughout the year as we go on this new adventure!

What made you want to do math workshop?
We love the small-group feel of guided reading or book clubs.  Grouping students based on ability has allowed us to meet the diverse needs of our students.  We spent last summer researching different current practices involving small group math instruction.  We wanted to try it to differentiate instruction to better meet the needs of all students.

How do you hold students accountable for their work when you aren't working with all groups?

During workshop, Tuesdays-Fridays, students fill out this station sheet at the beginning of math with the activity at each station.  As they travel between the different stations, they fill out this sheet with the work that they complete at those stations.  If they play a game at the game station, they write down their work in that box on the station sheet.  These are turned in and checked daily for participation and completion.  

How do you monitor behaviors for the three groups not at teacher station?

1)  Voice levels on the station sheet serve as reminders.

2)  Students reflect on their adherence to math workshop norms at the end of each workshop.

3)  We often get the teacher station started on a problem that they can work out, while we do a quick walk around the room.

4)  Providing engaging, thought-provoking, and meaningful activities promotes on-task and appropriate behaviors.

How long is a typical math class?
Our math block lasts anywhere from an hour to an hour and 15 minutes each day.