Instructor Notes:

For materials preparations, click ‘Back to Main Menu’ button and select ‘Getting Started – EDC Setup’.

Read Every Day Counts Teacher’s Guide, Kanter and Gillespie, Great Source, 2005 or 2012 edition, p. 52.

Getting Started with Measurement: After cutting fifteen 3 inch by 12 inch paper strips of one color and fifteen matching strips of a second color, show the class one strip and ask them to guess its length in inches. Use a ruler to confirm its length and to review 12 inches equals one foot. Explain that they’ll be putting one of these foot strips up each day of the month to see how far 30 feet will extend. Invite everyone to estimate how far will the tape reach by November 30.

If you change the color of the strips every three feet the yards will “pop” and give students the chance to see each foot as one third of a yard. Updating this Every Day Counts measurement element provides lots of practice translating feet to yards and fractions of a yard (by dividing or “packaging” the feet into groups of 3) as well as converting yards to feet (by multiplying by three and adding any extra feet). By month’s end, students will have a referent for 10 yards.