What is Mad Minutes?
Coming from upper grades and having a math background, I can tell you how IMPORTANT It is that kids are fluent with their addition and subtraction facts, I'm talking about the quick facts like 3+4 and 9-8. I can tell you it makes a word of difference when they get to harder math. If they have these fast facts under their belt they aren't spending so much time on the arithmetic but can instead focus on the bigger problem and it doesn't take them so long to do their math. I have also noticed those that are good at multiplying and dividing, also have high fact fluency in the areas of addition and subtraction. Therefore I have started doing Mad Minutes. If you have had a older sibling with me before, you will remember the 144, and the anticipation that came along with it. Everyone strove to get their math wizard band if they passed their 144 three weeks in a row. Well Mad Minutes has replaced that. Now, every Thursday we will do mad minutes. They have to complete 30 problems in 1 minute. Today (8/10/17) we did our first Mad Minute, starting with level one (+1). If they passed, next Thursday, they will move on to level 2 (+2). If the pass adding level 11, they get their Math Wizard Band. Then they move on to the levels of Subtraction to earn their second math Wizard Band. Many students today expressed interest in practicing. In the document below you can see an example of what each level looks like and print out the level you need to practice. They are half sheets of paper.