Make it Middle School

Problem Solving is the cornerstone of a successful math program. The following 25 problems can be used individually or with groups. A problem solving rubric is included to help assess a student's ability to communicate their understanding and mathematical processes. I have used these problems successfully in my 20 years as a middle school teacher, and I have grouped them according to strand. Enjoy!

This lesson and assignment introduce students to the steps needed to purchase a car. Steps include calculating tax, factoring in a down payment, calculating simple interest on a loan, and determining either monthly or biweekly payments. As with other videos in my distance learning math series, GIFs and music are used to make the lesson more engaging for students.

This is a culminating task giving students the opportunity to budget for a year while traveling abroad. Students must budget for a 4 month stay in 3 different countries: Australia, Japan, and Thailand. Different job opportunities are provided for each country, and students need to source out and budget for expenses such as accommodation, food, entertainment, etc. The jobs students must select are meant to be unique, generating strong interest. The video is fun and engaging, and there is a wo

This instructional video reviews how a scatterplot is used to determine a relationship between two variables. The video reviews how a two variable data set can also be displayed using circle graphs and double bar graphs. Three different scatterplots show the three kinds of relationships that potentially exist with two variables: positive, negative, and no relationship. The possibility of outliers is also addressed. Like my other instructional math videos, music and gifs help to make the mate

This instructional video goes over four different ways that people can manipulate the way you think about an issue by misrepresenting data on a graph. Whether it be manipulating the y-axis or cherry picking data, the manipulation of information on a graph can be difficult to detect, and students need the critical skills and practise to discern when information might not be as it appears. An assignment where students are asked to practise creating altered graphs is included. A rubric is also i