Writing+Expressions+and+Equations

=Writing Expressions and Equations=

I think crossing the river is a great activity to let you see how your students work together and problem solve- I use it with algebra and merit students on the first or second day of school.

Just a few word problems to translate into expressions- I have them printed out and glued to file folders and have pairs "rally" together to solve them.
 * [[file:Writing Expressions and Open Sentences Answers.doc]]-problems from above with answer key

This problem came from a lesson I found at the Annenberg site. Click on [|this link] to see the lesson plan, as it goes into good detail about how to "process" what the students come up with. I don't have the kids cut out strips, I just give them graph paper and have them draw the models. If you compare the formulas the students come up with, it also leads into a good discussion about the distributive property and combining like terms to simplify expressions.
 * [|Square Pool Border Problem]- I might like this one better than the pool border problem. Well written plan with lots of good questioning built in.

Roundtable activity for writing inequalities

Task for identifying equivalent expressions.