Teaching elementary-aged children is a rewarding experience, but as educators and parents, finding the time and resources to create engaging lessons can be a challenge. That's where this podcast comes in. Welcome to Naturally Teaching Elementary.

I'm Victoria Zablocki, a certified elementary teacher turned outdoor educator. With over a decade of experience coaching teachers on effective teaching methods, I'm passionate about teaching the whole child with authentic and place-based experiences in school and home settings. Join me as we explore strategies for teaching with practical teaching tips, insightful interviews, picture book reviews, and more.

So let's grow together. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to the Naturally Teaching Elementary podcast.

My name is Victoria Zablocki and I'm your host. So I recently had the pleasure of talking with Lauren MacLean about teaching elementary math outside and it got me really excited to add more episodes about math with concrete activity examples that you, the listener, can take outside today. So keeping with the spring theme that I've had going the last two episodes, I'm here to give you six elementary math activities that you can take outside this spring.

But before we get into today's elementary math activities, I wanted to share with you that I put together an activity index organizing all of the science activities from the podcast with the Next Generation Science Standards that they're aligned to. This will help you easily find the science activity that you're looking for, as well as the episode that it's described in. And it's all available to you for free.

And you can find a link to get the science activity index in the episode description, as well as the show notes on my website. And although it won't feature these math activities, it is chock full of great science activities that you can do with your elementary aged learners. So, in this episode, I'm going to describe elementary math activities for spring for grades K through 5.

For each activity, I'll share the Common Core State Standard that inspired that activity as well as the spring seasonal phenomenon the activity pairs with. And make sure you listen through to the end of the episode, because even though I've paired these activities to particular standards, you may find yourself inspired to use a similar concept for your curriculum or even use the same activity for a different grade. Also, if you're new to taking your students outside for learning, check out Episode 6: Five Outdoor Education Safety Tips for Teaching Outside, for suggestions to make teaching outside easier.

[2:25]

All right, now let's get into these elementary math activities for spring. So for kindergarten, the Common Core State Standard that I pulled was K.CC.B.4.b: Understand that the last number name said tells the number of objects counted. The number of objects is the same regardless of their arrangement or the order in which they were counted.

So how does this relate to spring? Spring is a time known for flowers, and flowers come in a variety of shapes, colors, and sizes. So let's take advantage of this diversity by rolling dice and matching the number of flower petals to the dots on the dice. So for this activity, you're going to need to bring out some dice with you and your learners. Show them their exploration space using natural boundaries and share with them that they're going to be rolling dice and looking for flowers that have the same number of petals as the number of dots that they rolled.

This will provide them the opportunity to practice one-to-one counting multiple times and also associate the last number counted as the number of objects, and in this case, dots or petals. You'll want to remind them of your expectations, including the rule that they need to keep themselves and nature safe. You can ask them, what does it look like to keep flowers safe?

Hopefully, you'll get children suggesting not to pick the flowers or their petals. If they need a reason why they shouldn't do these things, remind them that these flowers are an important food source for animals, so if they pick them, the animals won't have as much food to eat. But if they do pick them because they're excited, share in their excitement, but then gently remind them that next time, they can call you over to see the flower and to leave it connected to its stem.

If you haven't heard me talk about setting up expectations, make sure to go back to episode 6, as I mentioned before. I talk about making your outdoor space safe, how to use natural boundaries, how to share safety expectations and rules with your learners, and more. Decide how you want them to handle not being able to find a flower with a certain number of petals.

So as an example, it would probably be very difficult or impossible to find a flower with one petal. Do you want them to look at three flowers before they roll their dice again? If you can give them a tangible way to know that they've tried without having to rely on like a time frame, that will allow them to be more self-sufficient.

Plus, the whole goal of this activity is to have repeated practice counting, so you don't want them to get stuck on one number for the duration of the activity. After you've given them directions, hand each child a di and let them explore the space rolling the dice and looking for flowers to count the petals on. If you're to the point of learning larger numbers, you can make this into a partner activity where the partners both roll dice and then they have to count all of the dots and look for flowers with that number of petals.

Give them a certain amount of time to explore and check in with them as they run around trying to find flowers. And once their time is up, use your attention getter to bring them back together and have a discussion about what they've found. Were there any numbers that were really hard to find a flower for?

What number was the easiest to find? What was their favorite flower that they discovered? Having a wrap up chat will give them the chance to hear what others found as well as think about some questions that they may not have thought of themselves.

[5:29]

The Common Core State Standard that I pulled for first grade was 1.MD.A.1: Order three objects by length. Compare the lengths of two objects indirectly by using a third object.

So how does this relate to spring? Spring is a time for plant growth. Unlike the beginning of the school year, there are a variety of short plants available to you and your learners this season.

So let's give your learners a chance to practice some measuring while the plants are still small and measurable. So for this activity, you're going to need to bring out measuring tools with you and your learners. This could be rulers, measuring tapes, or non-standard measuring tools like a length of string.

Then you're going to show them their exploration space using natural boundaries again, and share with them that they're going to be measuring plants with their measuring tool and then ordering them based on length. Since these kiddos are still pretty young, you can bring out math journals and a pencil so they can record what they measured and what the measurement ended up being. This would make it easier for them to order them based on their lengths.

After giving them their directions, pass out a measuring tool to each child or pair of children and have them find plants to measure in your green space. If trees are included in your exploration space, you're going to have kiddos that want to measure how tall the tree is. But since they are really tall, you could encourage them to measure how big around the tree trunk is instead.

While they're measuring, make sure to walk around and talk with your learners. They're going to be having a lot of fun measuring. You may have to remind them to record what they've measured so that they can order them by length.

After they've measured at least three plants, use your attention getter to call them back to a picnic table, the sidewalk, or some other gathering space. Have them work by themselves or with a partner to order the different plants based on their lengths. Have a wrap-up conversation with your learners.

Were they able to tell which plants were the shortest and the tallest or did they need to look closely at their measurements? Did anyone find a plant that was exactly 12 inches tall? Did anyone find a plant that was shorter than an inch tall? What surprised them about measuring spring plants?

[7:24]

The Common Core State Standard that I pulled for 2nd grade was 2.MD.C.7: Tell and write time from analog and digital clocks to the nearest 5 minutes using a.m. and p.m.

So how does this relate to spring? Most people are grateful for spring because it brings longer hours of daylight. The vernal or spring equinox is marked by a near equal number of hours of daylight and nighttime and the hours of sunlight get longer and longer as your hemisphere gets closer to the summer solstice. Not closer to the sun, but closer to the summer solstice when you are tilted towards the sun. Follow this phenomenon by practicing reading analog and digital clocks for the sunrise and sunset times for each day.

So for this activity, you'll need the internet and or interactive teaching clocks to share the sunrise and sunset times with your students. You could do this a couple of different ways. Using a website like Time and Date or the Old Farmer's Almanac, prepare your teaching clocks with the sunrise time and sunset time for each day.

During calendar, daily five, or another time that makes sense, have your learners read the analog and digital clocks in pairs or by themselves. Alternatively, you could do this as a whole class activity where you project one of the websites onto your screen and work together to match the analog teaching clock to the digital clock readings provided by the website. Since the websites are key in this activity, you'll want to look around and find what fits your needs best.

I personally like different aspects of these two websites that I've mentioned, and I'll make sure to put a link for both of these in the show notes. As far as time and date, I like how they lay out the sunrise and sunset times in the graphic, making it kid-friendly and easy to find. However, there's a lot of other astronomical measurements and times if you scroll down, and your learners may get overwhelmed with the language and graphs.

And with the Old Farmer's Almanac, I like that it highlights the sunrise and sunset times and gives you the total amount of sunlight you can expect for that day, however, they do include a lot of other times in the same table and it can get confusing for your learners. But these are just two of many, look around and find what works for you.

[9:29]

The Common Core State Standard that I pulled for 3rd grade was 3.MD.A.2: Measure and estimate liquid volumes and masses of objects using standard units of grams, kilograms, and liters. Add, subtract, multiply, or divide to solve one-step word problems involving masses or volumes that are given in the same units, for example, by using drawings such as a beaker with a measurement scale to represent the problem.

So how does this relate to spring? If you live in a region where there was snow during winter, spring is a time for snow melting and rain collecting. When this happens in forests, small wetlands called vernal pools can form. These temporary ponds are critical to the development of certain animal species including fairy shrimp, mole salamanders, and wood frogs.

In the Northeast United States, vernal pools can form as early as late winter, early spring, and last through early summer usually. Let's embrace these natural bodies of water and look at finding the volume of natural materials using displacement. Alternatively, since many schools and homes do not have access to vernal pools, you could go out while it's raining or after it's rained and use puddles as your source of water or a bucket of water can work just as well too.

For this activity, you're going to need measuring containers such as beakers or graduated cylinders that have volume markings on the side and tongs or large tweezers are helpful as well. Take your measuring tools outside with you to a vernal pool and show your learners their exploration space using natural boundaries again. Then have your learners fill the containers up with water from the edge of the pool.

They'll need to make sure to line the water to the top number and not just fill the entire container. It's up to you on how specific you want to be about the meniscus created by the water. Do you want to be super scientific and have them line the bottom of the meniscus up with the highest line, or is it okay if it's off a little?

Have them make note of the top number. After they've got their measurements, they can place an object inside of their container while holding it over the vernal pool and let the water spill out and back into the pool. This part is important because even though we can't see them, there are microscopic invertebrates that live in the water and depend on the water for survival.

So they need to make sure that that water is spilling back into the vernal pool, not into the leaves or on the ground. After they've placed their object into the container, have them use the tongs or large tweezers to remove the object and see how much water is left behind. They should write down this new value and subtract it from their original number, and that will give them the volume of the natural object that they placed inside their container.

Depending on how much work you've done with this displacement, you may have to demonstrate how to do it the first time with your learners. But if they're more proficient, just remind them to stay within the boundaries and to make sure the objects are placed inside the container while they hold it over the vernal pool so that the water can spill back into its original place. And if this concept of vernal pools is interesting to you, be on the lookout for episodes in April.

We'll be talking about vernal pools, their importance as an ecosystem, how they impact frog life cycles, a citizen science project you can get involved in with your learners, and more.

[12:34]

For 4th grade, the Common Core State Standard that I pulled was 4.NBT.B.5: Multiply a whole number of up to four digits by a one-digit whole number, and multiply two two-digit numbers using strategies based on place value and the properties of operations. Illustrate and explain the calculation by using equations, rectangular arrays, and or area models. The Common Core State Standards are a lot longer than the Next Generation Science Standards, sorry.

How does this relate to spring? Early spring is maple syrup season in certain parts of the world. This is because these regions have trees that go dormant in the wintertime.

When that happens, those trees store their leftover food in their roots, and when the spring weather changes to below freezing at night, and above freezing during the day, the stored food gets turned back from starch to sap and moves up the trunk. People can then tap their maple trees and boil the sap down to make syrup. So, if you're in a region that can make maple syrup, you could take advantage of the dripping of the sap into buckets to practice two two-digit number multiplication.

So, for this activity, you're going to need a maple tree that's been tapped with a spile and a collection container like a bucket or a bag. If you don't have the equipment or the right conditions to collect maple sap, you could watch a video on YouTube instead, and I'll make sure to put a link to one in the show notes. Just note that this is being recorded in March of 2025, and the link may not work anymore depending on when you listen to this.

But I'm sure you'll be able to find an alternative if you search for a maple tree dripping sap or something similar. You'll also want paper and pencil for your learners to work through their multiplication. Then, take your learners outside to your maple bucket or bag, and work together to count the drips that fall into the container.

Depending on where your learners are at with multiplication, you could count drips for six seconds and then multiply by ten to get the number of drips per minute, or you could count for sixty seconds and then multiply that number by sixty to find the number of drips per hour. Metal buckets are nice because you can hear the drips hit the bottom of the bucket, but as long as it's visible, your learners will be able to count the drips and then do the multiplication. If you have more than one tap in different trees, make guesses as to which tree will have a quicker drip.

Trees that are in the sun tend to drip quicker. You could also use the same tap and visit in the morning to count and then visit in the afternoon to count. The days tend to get warmer and the sap moves faster as the temperature rises.

[15:02]

The Common Core State Standard for 5th grade that I pulled was 5.OA.B.3: Generate two numerical patterns using two given rules. Identify apparent relationships between corresponding terms. Form ordered pairs consisting of corresponding terms from the two patterns and graph the ordered pairs on a coordinate plane. For example, given the rule add 3 and the starting number is 0, and given the rule add 6 and the starting number 0, generate terms in the resulting sequences, and observe that the terms in one sequence are twice the corresponding terms in the other sequence, and explain why.

So how does this relate to spring? Spring is a time for growth and discovery. There are many new and interesting natural objects that you can find on the ground in spring after the snow melts. These objects are fun for learners of all ages to collect and could lend themselves well for a patterning activity.

So for this activity, you're just going to need your learners. Start by showing your learners their exploration space using natural boundaries again, and then assign them a partner. Their job is to collect materials that they find on the ground that are dead and no longer attached to anything.

Then, they will individually create mystery patterns from objects found in nature. Give them a time limit to create their patterns, maybe 10 minutes to collect and create. Once their time is up, have them take turns trying to guess what their partner's rule is.

For example, they can collect a bunch of acorns and leaves, and then they can put one acorn, then one leaf, then three acorns, then three leaves, then five acorns, then five leaves, and so on. This would be an example of adding two. If you wanted, you could bring graph paper, pencils, and clipboards out, and your pairs of learners could each make a graph of their pattern rules.

Then, they could make observations of the differences between those rules. This would be a fun and interesting way to practice patterning without having to use very many materials.

[16:54]

In a nutshell, we talked about teaching elementary math with six engaging spring activities. For kindergarten, we talked about counting and matching flower petals to numbers on dice. For first grade, we talked about measuring new spring sprouts and ordering them by length. For second grade, we talked about telling the time of the sunrise and sunset with both analog and digital clocks.

For third grade, we talked about finding the volume of natural materials using displacement with vernal pool water. For fourth grade, we talked about counting sap drips and calculating how many drips per hour the sap was being collected at. And for fifth grade, we talked about creating mystery patterns from objects found in nature and having partners guess what the rule is.

[17:32]

And I wanted to end real quick with a teaching tip. So we talk a lot about teaching science outside on this podcast, but teaching math outside is very similar. It may sound intimidating at first, but use what you already do to help you feel more confident.

Use the same routines you've set up for outdoor science learning and your indoor learning. That consistency is great for the kids and will help make the transition outside smoother. Use the same callbacks as you do in the classroom.

That auditory cue will keep your students focused and connected to the fact that this is learning time. You already have all the tools to teach elementary math outside. You just have to start the routine.

So as we wrap up, don't forget, if you'd like more ideas for taking math outside to learn, check out Episode 41: Teaching Elementary Math Outside with Lauren MacLean. She was an absolute delight to chat with, and she gave us so many ideas for taking math into nature. If you're loving this idea of taking your learning outside this spring, check out Episode 42: 6 Fun Spring Activities Aligned with K-5 Next Generation Science Standards for Science Activities and Episode 43: 9 Spring Picture Books to Help You Introduce Seasonal Signs, Plants and Animals.

And remember, if you enjoyed hearing about these elementary math activities for spring, make sure to check the show notes to get signed up for the free Science Activity Index to help you easily find what science activity you need when you need it. So thanks for taking time to listen today. I know you're busy, and I truly appreciate the time you take to tune in.

If you have any questions, wonderings, or spring activities you use for teaching elementary math, get ahold of me on Instagram at Naturally.Teaching, or you can email me at victoria@naturallyteaching.com. And don't forget to check out the show notes for this episode at naturallyteaching.com/episode44, where I'll have all the links that I mentioned. So thanks again for joining me today.

And until next time, keep exploring, keep learning, and keep naturally teaching. Thank you so much for tuning in to today's episode of the Naturally Teaching Elementary Podcast. I hope you found it informative, inspiring, and full of actionable insights to enhance your teaching journey.

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