When it comes to teaching divisibility rules, I feel it’s super important to jump on it early in the school year. The reason is that it’s one of those concepts which really pops up throughout the year.
Students use divisibility rules working with fractions, LCD, division of larger numbers, finding patterns, and factoring. Now, I don’t spend a lot of time on it… but, I certainly do review it and continually talk about it all year long…
Divisibility Rules isn’t just one lesson, but a series of little mini-lessons, activities, games and applications throughout the year.
Realizing that the divisibility rules is an all year long concept, I decided to have my husband create a divisibility rules poster to add to my ever growing Math wall. I had asked my husband to create a “mini” version and a legal sized version.
The idea behind the “mini” version of the math poster is so that my students are able to each have their own copy to keep in their binders/notebooks. I believe this will allow my students to reference the rules, when needed, in class or at home when completing homework.
The legal sized version of the math rules poster would be for my Math Wall.
So Other Than A Divisibility Rules Poster…What Else Is On My Math Wall?
I know that a million teachers will use math walls a million different ways and while mine isn’t perfect…it’s mine and it’s constantly growing and morphing into what works for me and my class. Currently on my Math wall I’ve got a math word wall, a couple of I can statements, of course the unit outcomes, and posters of concepts which I feel need to be referenced throughout the year.
As many of you know….I am a HUGE FAN of using task cards in middle school. I know I’ve said it before but it certainly bears repeating…using tasks cards allows me to differentiate the learning, focus on a topic and allows for a constant review on concepts already taught…So to go along with the divisibility rules posters…both mini and full size versions, I had my hubby design a set of divisibility rules task cards for my students to practice the concepts. These turned out to be a really big hit with my students and I can see them being used for years to come.
So, how about you? When do you introduce divisibility rules? I always love hearing from different teachers and how they engage their students. So feel free to drop a comment below!
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