At #TMC14, I made the following tweet,
while I was in a session about warm-ups as review. I was reminded of what Jessica posted about her warm-ups, and how she does something different each day of the week.
I was thinking of doing something similar, but I also wanted to include things like Counting Circles. But…I’m having trouble with the disparity. Something like Counting Circles is very different from Estimation180 which is very different from a Throwback Thursday review problem. How can we get used to the norms of a counting circle if we only do it once a week?
I could just commit to one of these things, but I feel they are all important, so I didn’t know what to do. But now I had the thought…what if I did these routines but, instead of once a week, I did them for, saying, a marking period, then switched to another?
This could work because many of the routines match up with certain units – Counting Circles would be very helpful for linear functions, while Visual Patterns would be useful for functions in general (or perhaps for when we do quadratics). Does this sound like a good idea?
James Cleveland-Tran
The Roots of the Equation 
Comments on: "What’s a routine?" (3)
I also have a hard time with Do Nows/Warm Ups that rotate on a daily basis – where does that help build proficiency and help students improve their skills? By rotating so much I think that they are just used as time fillers to take care of admin at start of class and not let students learn. I like your idea – by keeping with the same routine for a time (week/unit/grading period/etc..) the students will know what to expect each day and build upon their skills if done right.
I use Daily Math Review (part or 5 easy steps to a balance math program) with 3 different questions for my Do Now as students enter my classroom. I use it to help fill gaps from previous grade levels that I don’t have time to teach and pre-teach skills they need in upcoming units. I do two week cycles and only move on when most of the class has mastered the skill/question and may end up doing the same type of question for a month until moving on. I have it down to 10 minutes, maybe 15 minutes on the first day or two of a new cycle.
I like this idea a lot. I am currently not doing any bell work at all, but I just can’t see starting class with a different routine every day being something that would work for me. I also feel conflicted because all of these things seem valuable to students. I think this could be a really great solution. Maybe have a warm-up of the month? I am going to give that some serious consideration.
[…] I had different warm-up routines I wanted to try, I’m this week ending my second go at Counting Circles, and won’t be using them again […]