Teacher Stories: Brain Lab

Ecole St-Roch | Mason-Rice Elementary | Santa Monica Alternative School House | Simcoe County District School Board

Students Have a Blast Learning the 3 S's of the Super Solver System!

Melanie Rioux, 5th grade teacher
Ecole St-Roch, Quebec City, Canada

Melanie was one of the first to try our Rush Hour and Chocolate Fix Brain Lab programs and translated all materials into French to use with her students! Here she shares her experience using these programs in the classroom:

Rush Hour Brain Lab teaches the Super Solver Steps:

Most students can't really describe the Steps they go through while trying to solve a problem. When asked, many simply say "I try to solve the problem." I think Rush Hour Minimum Spaces is a great way to teach these Steps, since kids must do challenges over and over until they get the right answer.

The Create-Your-Own final activity was my favorite piece of this Lab. Students were really excited when told they would be creating challenges. At first, they thought it would be easy, but they soon realized it wasn't that obvious. Students were very focused, trying their challenges and finding ways to make them harder. When they finished, I tested their challenges and choose 8 good ones. The kids tried them and voted on their favorite.

Next year, I intend to use this as an evaluation, because when you look at the difficulty of the challenge created, you can really see how far the student went with this project. Students loved this exercise, and I often heard them commenting, "Wow — it's HARD to create a challenge!" This gave them new respect for game development!

Chocolate Fix Brain Lab teaches Super Solver Strategies:

From my point of view, the piece of this Brain Lab in which students make real-life connections is essential. Kids named a lot of simple life problems and found the appropriate Super Solver Strategy they could use (cleaning bedroom = "find a good place to start" and “break into smaller problems”). They even made links to school problems, such as making corrections to a text.

The other day, when working on a problem in which kids had to match equivalent fractions, one said, "We should use the strategy 'eliminate possibilities,' that would help!" I am glad to see my students making links between the Brain Lab and other kinds of math problems.

On one mission report, a student reflected, "In real life, I should divide things into smaller problems because I tend to dramatize." I think we’ve gained something here!

In Quebec, we have to evaluate the way kids explain their solution using a mathematical proof, so the "Prove It" portion of this Lab was a perfect evaluation. I asked students to choose 2 challenges, find the solution, and explain themselves. Some are better than others at explaining their strategies, but I am very happy with the results. As a teacher, it really helps to see what they've learned through this Brain Lab, and I intend to use that for the report card.

The Super Solver State of Mind:

My students reacted a lot to the State of Mind piece of the Super Solver System, and they recognized that they often tend to give up when a problem is hard.

Recently, while working through a difficult challenge, I overheard a student say, "It doesn't work, it’s too hard," to which her team mate responded, "Hey, you aren't being a Super Solver here! You can't give up — we are going to find it!" That made me very proud!

In a Mission Report reflection, a student with big learning difficulties wrote: I have been a Super Solver because I have taken risks. I didn't give up even with my difficulty. I think I've achieved what I needed to achieve, and I went through all of it and this is a big, big step for me. Now, I am proud because thanks to Chocolate Fix, I've learned things I didn't know before. I am proud of me!!!

Once a week, I have a workshop where kids play different games (Chocolate Fix, Rush Hour, Pete's Pike, and others...). Since completing the Brain Lab, I've seen a difference because the kids are trying harder. The Super Solver State of Mind really changed their way of solving problems, and this is such a gain for them.

At the end of the program, I had an award ceremony and all the kids got an award. About half received the "Super Star" award, and the other half attained "Super Solver Star" status! The kids were proud, and their teacher was even prouder!

Rush Hour Lesson in a 2nd Grade Class at Mason-Rice Elementary

Scott Axelrod
Director of Research, Falcon Management, Wyckoff, NJ
Freelance Mathematician, Newton, MA

Scott Axelrod is a former Professor of Mathematics and a great friend to ThinkFun. In February, 2009 he visited a 2nd grade class at his daughter's school to lead a Rush Hour lesson, and he shares the story below:

Students had several Rush Hour games available in class for a couple of weeks before the lesson. At the start of the lesson, I went over the rules to make sure everyone understood them. We then worked through a series of boards to solve. The first board consisted of just the red car and was solved just by sliding the red car to the right. The next games got more complex by adding one car at a time to the starting configuration. Student volunteers were able to solve all the games. Along the way we talked about how moving the red car to the right was their long term goal, but they had to make intermediate and short term goals to figure out how to accomplish their longer term goal. The classroom teacher pointed out that this need to make a plan for a solution is coming up more often in class now that the problems the students are getting are more complicated.

Since our first series of games was created by adding a piece to the previous game, students often solved a game by moving the piece that was most recently added, then proceeding to solve the simpler game. I mentioned how this was an example of the mathematician's technique of "reducing to a previous solved problem," and I talked about how learning math requires learning the language of math.

Next we looked at the game from card # 40 (the last card) provided by ThinkFun. Several students thought they saw a solution right away, but I could assure them that it was not so simple. I had everyone guess what the smallest number of spaces to solve the game was. Most people guessed low numbers, although one student guessed as high as 70. In fact, the minimum number of spaces that need to be moved to solve the games is 81. That was truly a long range goal! ThinkFun offers several of these types of challenges with their Minimum Spaces online program.

I explained that while the computer looked pretty smart to solve the problem in 81 spaces right away, it was actually just trying lots and lots or possibilities very quickly. I then projected a problem on the screen that all the students could solve immediately. Using a version of the program I created, we saw that the computer could not solve it with a "stack size" of 10,000. This means that the computer did the equivalent of using 10,000 pieces of paper just in order to fail to see the solution that all students could see at a glance!

To give the second graders a break from concentrating so hard, they all got on the floor to form a human Rush Hour game. The goal was to solve the game by moving only one "piece" (person) at a time. After a while, it became clear that the game could not be solved because there was a person in the way of the red "car," positioned between her and the exit. We solved the game anyway by eliminating the blocking person.

After the floor exercise, students formed small groups to play Rush Hour GridLock, a group activity suggested by ThinkFun. In this game, students take turns adding one piece at a time until someone claims the board can not be solved. Then everyone says whether they think that board can be solved or not. Anyone who thinks it can be solved tries to show a solution, and anyone who thinks it can't be solved tries to explain why.

As an alternative to this precise activity, there was a particular board projected on the screen which students could decide was solvable or not. When we came back together as a big group, almost everyone agreed the projected board was not solvable. We ended the class with several people, including myself and the classroom teacher, giving our explanations of why we thought the game was not solvable.

Brain Lab engages Middle Schoolers in Problem Solving through Play

Scott Kim, Puzzlemaster
Santa Monica Alternative School House, Santa Monica, California, USA

Scott Kim is a true puzzle genius. To ThinkFun fans, he is best known as the inventor of the Railroad Rush Hour challenges, but he also designs original puzzles for the web, creates computer games, and writes a puzzles column in Discover Magazine. Scott is a great friend of ThinkFun Education, and we were thrilled when he volunteered to test our early Rush Hour Brain Lab program in his son's school. His feedback and practical suggestions for ways to successfully implement this program in the classroom are valuable tools for teachers. What follows is Scott's account of his testing experience:

Yesterday I did three one-hour sessions with three groups of about 20 students each: 6th grade, then 7th, then 8th. The sessions all went well. The students were enthusiastic and involved and were able to connect Rush Hour to more general problem solving strategies.

After the first session, I talked it over with the classroom teacher whose suggestions made the other two sessions run much more smoothly. Her two big ideas were start by explaining that puzzles are a way of learning general problem solving strategies, and have the kids move away from playing with the Rush Hour pieces when you want to talk with them and reflect.

Here's the lesson sequence I came up with:

1. TALK ABOUT PROBLEM SOLVING

Instead of diving straight into playing Rush Hour, begin by talking about how puzzles relate to general problem solving. I asked the open-ended question, "What does playing puzzles have to do with math?" As these classes regularly play math games at the beginning of class as warm-up, students were ready with good answers.

One student said that puzzles use the same part of your brain that math does, and the teacher compared puzzles to warm-up exercises athletes do to keep their bodies fit. I explained that math has two parts: particular topics like algebra and trigonometry that apply to particular situations, and more general problem solving strategies that apply broadly to everyday situations. I don't use algebra in my daily life, but the problem solving skills I learned by doing algebra I use all the time.

Simcoe County District School Board I asked the students to list some of their problem solving strategies, and they quickly named several, including:

Get a different perspective
Consider all information
Ask questions
Work backwards

I recorded these strategies on the board, and after each exercise I added to the list. The Super Solver System poster was useful here, and it was clear that a list of problem-solving strategies should be posted prominently and added to throughout the year. The classroom teacher planned to transcribe this strategies list onto a large sheet of paper to display.

2. DEMONSTRATE AND PLAY RUSH HOUR

I asked how many students had seen Rush Hour. About half had, and when students first came into class, many spontaneously enthused about how much they love the game. Tables were set up around the edge of the classroom with a big clear space in the middle, and I brought my giant Rush Hour game (a special gift from ThinkFun not sold in regular stores) and set up the easy configuration (challenge 1). Displaying challenges on the online practice board using a SMART Board or projector or using the overhead Rush Hour game board would work equally well for large-group demonstration. I had the entire group solve it by having one person at a time tell me one move to make. This got the whole class involved, taught them the rules, and kept everyone focused on the same thing. I had kids get in groups of 2 or 3 and handed each group a Rush Hour to play for 10 minutes. I asked them to try at least three puzzles and notice what strategies they were using.

3. REFLECT

I had the kids stop playing, and sit in a circle away from their desks. I found it is important to get kids away from the Rush Hour sets when you want them to focus on discussion, otherwise they will keep fiddling with the pieces and be distracted. I asked students to talk about problem solving strategies they used and added them to the strategies list on the board.

4. DEMONSTRATE GRIDLOCK

I asked students to imagine how they would invent a Rush Hour puzzle. Students consistently came up with the Rush Hour Scramble idea (beginning with a solved challenge and working backwards to scramble the vehicles into a challenging arrangement), knowing this would insure a solution. I demonstrated how to play Gridlock by first placing the escape car in the escape row, demonstrating that I didn't want to place it on a different row or column or put it right at the exit. I involved the whole group by handing one piece at a time to different students and having them place them on the board, with the instruction that each piece should make the puzzle harder, but still solvable. The whole group could see what was happening, and laughed when students did silly things, like completely blocking the escape car from getting out. Very lively!

5. INVENTING PUZZLES

The puzzle must have at least 8 pieces, including the escape car.
No cars can be in the same row and in front of the escape car.
When you write down the puzzle, don't worry about colors, Just draw the outlines (some groups insisted on drawing in color anyway).
Write your name(s) on the paper and turn it in.
If I'd had more time I would have had everyone play each other's puzzles.

Rating puzzles is an excellent exercise. Here I folded Rush Hour Rating into the Invention exercise by having them rate their own puzzles rather than a standard set puzzle, but I think either exercise is valuable. For my purposes, having students rate their own puzzles was more economical and allowed me to do a lot in a single session.

*An idea for ambitious teachers: As students design original puzzles, a fun idea could be to create challenge cards that look like the actual Rush Hour deck. You can by pre-perforated card stock (sold as inserts for name badges with each card measuring 2.25" by 3.5") that is about the same size as the cards. It would be great for a class to create a deck of puzzles with the names of the student inventors on the cards. This is a natural next step after the invention exercise.

6. REFLECT

Again, I had the kids stop playing and sit in a circle. I asked students to talk about problem solving strategies they used and added them to the list. Some strategies this exercise generated:

Put pieces on the board randomly and try to solve it. Fix it if it doesn't work.
Make the puzzle look hard by putting many pieces on the board, but actually make it easy to solve
Work backwards (like the Rush Hour Scramble challenge)

CLASSROOM PROGRAMS ENGAGE STUDENTS AND TEACHERS ALIKE IN ONTARIO!

Troy Comish, K-12 Numeracy Curriculum Consultant
Simcoe County District School Board, Ontario, Canada

I am currently a K-12 Numeracy Curriculum Consultant with the Simcoe County District School Board in Ontario Canada. I was introduced to the Think Fun products and specifically the Game Club resource by Tanya a few years ago. Ever since then I have been simply hooked!

I immediately saw the huge impact that this resource could have within our Board of Education by promoting both problem solving strategies and social skills with our students. I am very proud to say that we have Game Club kits in over 80% of our elementary schools. I have received nothing but extremely positive feedback from administrators, teachers and most importantly, students regarding the use of Game Club.

To support schools that did not purchase Game Club kits, I have developed a Game Club Kit lending program that has become a nightmare for me, as it is simply impossible to get the kits returned on time to lend to the next school. I have spent many evenings dodging teachers and sneaking through darkened halls and classroom trying to retrieve my Game Club kits to pass onto the next school. Once teachers and students have the opportunity to interact with the Game Club, they simply refuse to give it up!

Although our initial focus was on elementary schools, many of our secondary schools are currently integrating the Game Club Kits in several of their math courses as well. Secondary teachers and students have also provided nothing but positive feedback regarding the inclusion of the Game Club resource into their Numeracy programs.

I guess I have come to realize that it doesn't matter if the student is in Kindergarten or Grade 10, they simply want more time to develop their problem solving and social skills with this engaging resource.

Our Teachers and Students are just beginning to work with the Think Fun Brain Labs. The Brain Labs are a fantastic way to reinforce the Three S’s of Problem Solving (steps, strategy and state of mind). The online support provides our teachers with a wide variety of resources and teaching strategies and the students simply love the activities. We look forward to investigating ways to incorporate many of our Game Club resources into the Brain Lab activities as they are developed.