Open Middle - "open middle" refers to problems that may start the same way for all students, and have only one answer, but are characterized by an "open middle"--the actual solving of the problem leaves the door wide open for various strategies! An excellent resource, with problems organized by topic and grade (kindergarten through high school).
A word problem generator from Greg Tang Math. This is a great resource to use for coming up with generic practice problems.
Marilyn Burns has some GREAT problem-solving activities posted on her blog and published in various articles. These are a few that I found:
- 1-10 Card Investigation
- How many fingers? How many pockets? (K-2)
- 3 different card and dice games for problem solving
A TED Talk by Dan Meyers - I especially like his tip of asking: what's the question?? Before diving into procedures, formulas, etc., he advises to get the conversation going--that is the first step to fostering problem-solving in the classroom!
- More from Dan Meyers: his "3 Act" math problems are great, and I could see them being easily adaptable for any grade/math topic!
Which one doesn't belong? These would be great warm-ups for a lesson, and could be great discussion-starters! See sets of shapes, numbers, and graphs, as well as a few incomplete sets..
Brain teasers from Math Illuminations. Each problem and its solution can be downloaded as a PDF.
A post on the Math Coach's Corner addressed a problem-solving strategy, especially for word problems. Begin by asking: what do you notice? What do you wonder?
See the blog post here, and see a 2-page resource from the Math Forum here. A few more pages dealing with similar problem-solving strategies such as "numberless word problems":
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