NBA Math Hoops !
Last Fall I received an email as part of a list serv that discussed the opportunity to work in partnership with a former Brown student Khalil Fuller on his quest to partner with the NBA to link basketball to math in a fun and engaging board game. My first thoughts were free stuff sign me up, well I continued to read that they were taking only 300 educators for a pilot run of the game and there was an application to fill out. I quickly began filling it out thinking the school I was at stood a good chance as we were 100% free and reduced, but we were also at best six hours away from any NBA team. To my excitement I was chosen as a trial pilot school.
Math Hoops Monday was then made. We played every Monday in math support with a culminating tournament. Students were practicing basic math skills, but more important their reasoning. Conversations overheard from students moved away from I want Lebron James purely because they recognized the name to how about this player they have a higher percentage of making a basket than he does etc. They also were reasoning about numbers students quickly were picking up on patterns that certain rolls of the dice only led to even numbers or odd numbers resulting in a turnover, and best of all for a teacher they were engaged and didn't believe it was actually math. Hands were in the air with excitement, high-fives were going around, and students were learning to solve disputes commonly seen were rock paper scissors and let's redo it.
Well Christmas came early for me this year when NBA Math Hoops sent out an email with information on receiving the updated game. I am excited and my students are excited for the new games. They are even asking questions about it. What about new players? What about "old timers" In fact writing this an idea came to me that maybe it wouldn't be a bad investment to let students make cards of players they do not find. This would be do-able for seventh grade students.
And through my early Christmas I am excited to mention all of my pilot kits will be going to a third grade classroom in the district for students to play. They will not be sitting on the shelf I found a teacher who will use them. So Math Hoops for All.
Below is a link to math hoops, and a video clip of the game. There currently is an outreach to get math hoops to more locations so if interested contact information is available on their website.
(For some reason the video won't upload so here is the link to the video)
http://nbamathhoops.org/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UeN-Nh52pU
Math Hoops Monday was then made. We played every Monday in math support with a culminating tournament. Students were practicing basic math skills, but more important their reasoning. Conversations overheard from students moved away from I want Lebron James purely because they recognized the name to how about this player they have a higher percentage of making a basket than he does etc. They also were reasoning about numbers students quickly were picking up on patterns that certain rolls of the dice only led to even numbers or odd numbers resulting in a turnover, and best of all for a teacher they were engaged and didn't believe it was actually math. Hands were in the air with excitement, high-fives were going around, and students were learning to solve disputes commonly seen were rock paper scissors and let's redo it.
Well Christmas came early for me this year when NBA Math Hoops sent out an email with information on receiving the updated game. I am excited and my students are excited for the new games. They are even asking questions about it. What about new players? What about "old timers" In fact writing this an idea came to me that maybe it wouldn't be a bad investment to let students make cards of players they do not find. This would be do-able for seventh grade students.
And through my early Christmas I am excited to mention all of my pilot kits will be going to a third grade classroom in the district for students to play. They will not be sitting on the shelf I found a teacher who will use them. So Math Hoops for All.
Below is a link to math hoops, and a video clip of the game. There currently is an outreach to get math hoops to more locations so if interested contact information is available on their website.
(For some reason the video won't upload so here is the link to the video)
http://nbamathhoops.org/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UeN-Nh52pU
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