Ms. McHugh's Corner: Where Mathletes Come to Train: Wrapping up Notebooks: A time for Reflection

Last week was our last full week of school, so when Friday rolled around, we used our last full class together to wrap up our Interactive Math Notebooks. When I told my students it would be our last entry, some loudly groaned and others said audible "Noooooo!'s" I'll admit, I was sad too. We had all grown fond of the days we would add a new entry. They were all very excited that our last entry fell on page 100, which had been our goal for a while. "Ms. McHugh! We wrote a book that is 100 pages long!" And it's true, we did write a book. Who says Math and Language Arts don't go together??

Before adding our last page, I had created a word scramble page from SuperTeachers (currently a free feature). Each of the words were math terms that could be found in their table of contents. This was just a fun way to sum up our year together. Next, we all sat on the floor (Kindergarten style, as I call it) and slowly flipped through each page of our Notebook. This was by far the best part of that entire week. They couldn't believe all we had learned and how far we had come! Some mentioned that when we entered certain pages, they still had not understood it completely, but now at the end of the year, they "got it." This was a great lesson to learn. It doesn't always "click" for all our students at the same time. But with a little bit of hard work and a lot of perseverance, most students understood everything by the end of the year. Our Notebooks were a great reminder of that.

After we reflected on the year as a class, I let them make their very last foldable. This was a reflection on what they thought they were good at in math, things that were difficult or easy for them, and times that they had the most fun. I must admit, most said they had fun when their teacher got distracted or off track. What? I have no idea what they are talking about......

Here are some of my favorites from that last day: