Properties of Operations Sort

Properties of Operations is not my favorite thing to teach. I love how numbers work and sharing that with students but I am not a fan of having to memorize names.

So students took notes and they found patterns in equations and describe the rules.

For example, I put the following equations:

1+0=1
0.54+0=0.54
34+0=34

I asked them to find what rule these equations were describing and asked them to find an example of when the rule wouldn't work.

I wanted students to see that they already knew most of these properties, they just didn't now the names.

After they took notes, we did a card sort. Each group got a bag with the names of the properties we discussed and equations to match to the property.

I love card sorts in math and I loved hearing the conversations they had as they disagreed and tried to convince each other. I also loved seeing them refer to their notebooks because my students see to forget that it is there.

If groups finished early, I gave them a dry erase marker and had them write their own equations to show the different properties. I think I will do this part more later. For the few groups that got to it, it was a great way to see if they understood what each property said. 

If you are interested in the card sort, it is available on Teachers Pay Teachers.