This Smart Board presentation walks the teacher and students through an excellent hands-on activity, using goldfish crackers and post-it notes, to work on discovering patterns. It also allows the teacher to show there are multiple ways to solve a problem as some kids will draw pictures, some will make charts, and some will find a math problems. AT the end of the lesson the class works together to create an algebraic equation from the pattern they learned. This is a fabulous intro to equations and my students loved it.
It can stand alone, fit in with your classroom math plabs, or go with the M3 Awesome Algebra Unit.