Skip Counting

I can never assume that ALL of the 6th graders know their multiples up to 12 x 12, but most of them do.  It’s an essential skill that makes life easier, so I make a point to ensure EVERY student can skip count by (at least) 12.   Early in the year we do some skip counting programming and then, later on, use it to write programs to find LCM.

The students enjoy writing skip-counting programs and I like to share their programs with teachers in lower grades when they are skip counting.  My students feel good knowing that they are writing programs to help students in the lower grades.  And lower grade kids then have a chance to learn a little bit of coding, too!

I usually start them out with something like this (using scratch):

I then enhance the lesson by having students:

• change the speed at which the cat counts (there is so much room for learning here….am I sure that ALL of my students understand that 0.315 of a second is SMALLER than 0.6 of a second?  )
• Have the students enhance the code a little and have the cat ask how high he should count to.
• For more advanced students, use MOD to determine if the “count to” number is a multiple of the given number.  If it’s not, how would the cat help the user modify his/her number?