1. How To Play:
      Grade 2
      Tips for Helping at Home
      •
      Questions to ask:
      What is it that you don’t understand (have
      the student be specific)?
      What information do you need?
      What strategies are you going to use?
      Can you guess and check?
      Does this make sense?
      What can you do to explain your answer to
      show others what you are thinking?
      Does your answer seem reasonable?
      •
      For homework you child will be playing Guess My
      Rule with about 20 household objects. Your child
      will teach you and other family members this
      game. Guess My Rule is also fun to play in a
      large group of people.
      •
      You child might be interested in working with our
      sink-and -float experiment at home. Ask your
      child to explain this experiment to you and, if pos-
      sible, together investigate other objects that sink
      and float.
      •
      You child will also be collecting some information
      from you that will become part of a set of data
      that we will be using in the classroom. You might
      need to help your child write this information.
      •
      Finally, as you are reading the newspaper or
      watching the news, point out graphs and charts
      to your child. We live in an
      information-rich society,
      and it is important for stu-
      dents to begin to experi-
      ence the variety of ways
      that information is commu-
      nicated and represented in
      the world.
      Mathematical Emphasis
      Investigation 1—Sorting People and Yekttis
      •
      Examining carefully the differences and similarities in a
      group of related objects or related data
      •
      Using negative information to clarify the definition of a
      category
      •
      Sorting and classifying information
      •
      Collecting, recording, and representing data
      •
      Using more than one representation to view data
      •
      Using Venn diagrams to show various relationships
      within a group of related objects
      Investigation 2—Collections: What Goes Together?
      •
      Thinking flexibly about the characteristics of data
      •
      Articulating logical reasoning
      •
      Constructing categories with clear definitions for describ-
      ing categorical data
      •
      Inventing representations of data
      •
      Building theories about the data
      Investigation 3: Animals in the Neighborhood
      •
      Constructing categories to describe data
      •
      Articulating clear definitions of categories
      •
      Organizing categorical data
      Website
      http://www.everett.k12.wa.us/math/Second%20Grade
      Sorting and
      Classifying Data
      Vocabulary
      Vocabulary
      Vocabulary
      data - information about people or groups
      of objects
      representation - graph, picture or chart
      that shows how a collection was sorted
      categories - organizing objects or people
      by a theme
      Yetkkis - figures that can be sorted by
      shape, eyes, or antennae
      About the Mathematics In This Unit
      In this unit your child will collect data and will
      learn about sorting and classifying data. Once
      data are collected, they have to be organized in
      some way so that they can be analyzed and
      compared. Children begin the unit by playing
      Guess My Rule - a game in which they analyze
      data and try to figure what is alike.
      Children continue the unit with data collection
      projects. They collect data about objects that
      sink and float, about what animals can be found
      in the neighborhood, and in what ways these
      animals move about. Children will invent ways
      of organizing and presenting the data they col-
      lect and also use some traditional ways such as
      making graphs and drawing pictures.
      Russell, S. Investigations in Number, Data and Space: Does It
      Walk, Crawl, or Swim?. Dale Seymour Publications, 1998.
      Glossary
      http://www.amathsdictionaryforkids.com/
      Game
      Guess My Rule with Thing
      Collections
      Materials:
      a Thing Collection made of 15 - 20
      small objects that are all different from each
      other, such as a spoon, a penny, a crayon, a
      paper clip, a safety pin, a small block, a birthday
      candle, and so on.
      How To Play:
      The object of the game is to figure out the Mys-
      tery Rule by trying to place objects from the
      Thing Collection into one of two categories.
      1. The rule maker decides on a Mystery Rule
      for sorting the Thing Collection into two
      groups: one group that fits the rule and one
      group that doesn’t fit the rule. For example,
      a rule might be “made of plastic” or “is red.”
      2. The rule maker starts the game by showing
      three objects that fit the rule and two objects
      that do not fit the rule.
      3. The guessers try to find other objects that fit
      the rule.
      4. With each guess, the object is placed in one
      of two piles: “fits the rule” or “does not fit the
      rule.” Both piles should be clearly visible.
      The rule maker says if a placement is cor-
      rect. If it is not, the object is placed in the
      correct group.
      5. Guessers continue to place objects in the
      two piles. Once all the objects have been
      correctly sorted, the guessers guess the
      rule.

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