A few years back, I attended the NCTM conference in Seattle and had my mind blown a little bit at the Illustrative Math session I attended. I loved a few of their routines, but my favorite was one that I had never heard of called “Information Gap”. They blog about it here.

Info gap essentially turns any word problem into a collaborative partner routine. You separate the essential information into two cards, and students are not allowed to show their partner what is on their card. They can ask questions, and even read what is on their card, but it is not possible to find the correct solution without the help of their partner. They must find some way to navigate this “information gap” together. I loved the discussion that this routine fostered, and the level of rigor that you are able to put into a problem without turning students off immediately. It transforms a dry word problem into a puzzle that the students must piece together in order to find a solving strategy.

I couldn’t find an easy way to search for resources for this specific activity on the IM website (that might be user error), so I ended up building out my own routine and my own problem sets for a bunch of spots in my Algebra 1 curriculum. I have started making some problem sets for Geometry too (arc length and triangle proofs are included below) but I will hopefully be adding pythag, angles, and triangle trig problem sets soon.

This routine forces collaboration, and I reinforce that with middle schoolers by asking them that they show their work on this note-catcher with different colored ink.

I used this routine with great success at my school in Seattle, and the two times that I have tried it since moving to Colombia have worked pretty well too. (my classes are bigger, so I did away with the note catcher. They solve on whiteboards now). I like to print the “question” sheet on colored paper, and pre-staple and pre-cut so that I can quickly hand out each new problem to groups as they finish the problem prior. It’s worth the prep.

I also try to give groups problems in a random order so that they are working together against each problem, and not trying to race other groups in the class. When this routine works, your main job is to monitor, give feedback and check their thinking against an answer key. Here’s some stuff I made. I hope it’s helpful!

Resources:

Editable powerpoint slides:

PDF versions of:

A quick write-up on an even quicker routine that I use regularly in my class: Pick ’em.

Who doesn’t like a good booger joke?

Way back when I was teaching in Denver, I came up with this idea for a role board. Each desk in each group (I group my kids in groups of 4) gets a small dot of nail polish. Red, Blue, Green or Yellow. It lets me assign tasks randomly to students in a group. For example, “Red desk, bring up papers for your group” or “Blue desks, share your ideas at your table first.”

To go with the dots of color, I bought these clear containers at The Container Store and made some little colored circles out of construction paper and a Dominoes pizza box.

The circles are red, blue, green and yellow and match the dots on the desks, and I move the dots each time before I use them to assign jobs. With the “1,2,3,4” role cards shown above, the blue desk would go first, then the green desk, then red, then yellow.

I like this setup because it is very visually clear what each kid should be doing, and it keeps things random for the kids. It’s also very easy to create new “role” cards for behind the dots, so you can use the roles for a wide variety of classroom activities. I use this role board with many of my classroom routines, but this is the simplest one. I use it as a better “you do” activity when I use direct instruction in class.

I start by putting up a set of problems (this is a graphing problem set) for the kids to see. The desk whose color is in the “1” position gets first “pick” of the problems on the board. They would share with their group what they pick, and begin working. “2” picks next and so on. No two members of a group can pick the same problem. It introduces a small amount of choice to class, every kid at each table gets a different problem, and gets the kids talking about the problems that they are working on.

I also use a variant often that I call “Pick and Role”

It’s basically the same thing, but I have the students TEACH the rest of their groups how to solve the problem that they are working on. I usually provide a vocab bank for them to use, and again, I use the role board to assign who explains their process/ thinking first.

Sometimes, I have the kids pass their mini-whiteboards to the next person in their group to have them grade each other’s work. I call that Pick ’em, Pass ’em. And I use this graphic. Because Boogers are funny. Even if you’re 34 years old.