The purpose of this activity is for students to create an addition or subtraction story problem. Students think of their own subject for the story problem, or they think of a story problem about the provided picture.

• “Did anyone hear a story problem with addition, or adding more things?”
• Invite 2-3 students to share. Write an expression to represent each story problem.
• “Did anyone hear a story problem with subtraction, or taking away?”
• Invite 2-3 students to share. Write an expression to represent each story problem.

The purpose of this activity is for students to create an addition or subtraction story problem. Students come up with a story problem that uses the same subject as their partner’s story problem, but they change the operation. This gives them an opportunity to compare the action in addition and subtraction problems. Students solve their partner’s story problem.

• Invite 2-3 groups of students to share story problems about the same subject but with a different operation.

The purpose of this activity is for students to learn a new variation of Stage 2 of the Math Stories center. One student chooses a mat and tells a story based on the background of the math. The story involves addition or subtraction and includes a question. Their partner uses counters or connecting cubes to act out the story and answer the question. Then, each student draws a picture to represent the story and writes the answer to the question on their recording sheet.

After they participate in the center, students choose any previously introduced stage from these centers:

• Bingo
• Math Fingers
• Subtraction Towers
• 5-Frames
• Counting Collections

• Invite 2 students to share different story problems about the same mat.
• As each student shares, record the action with words and numbers and an expression. For example: “3 and 6” and “.”
• “What was the same about the stories? What was different?”