Algebraic Equations

I had the awesome opportunity to go to a two day education conference this year.  One of our keynote speakers at the conference was Ron Clark, the founder of Ron Clark Academy in Georgia!  Holy MOLY, loved this man!!  He was a little ball of energy that inspired me to want to be a better teacher.  You have to check out his school.

While at the conference, Ron talked about teaching his students algebraic equations with balloons.  He did this by writing the equation on a balloon and if a student got it right they could pop the balloon.  Talk about motivational!

I LOVE, HEART, ADORE Amazon.com.  It is where I do 80% of my shopping for school supplies, books and other "necessary" items.  Because of this, I have a steady supply of boxes and packing bubbles coming in.  Amazon usually packs with little air pouches.  Heaven knows I have a lot of little air pouches.  Being a teacher who thinks everything can be reused (you know what I mean), I have always wondered what I could use these little air pouches for.  So the other day when a box came from Amazon, I had an idea!  Algebraic equations with air pouches!

First I took some acrylic paint and painted the tops of the air pouches (the side that does not have writing on it).

After the bubbles dried, I wrote algebraic equations on the bubbles with a Sharpe marker.  

 

Voila!  We have bubble equations!

Another great thing about these bubbles, they have tear marks to be easily pulled apart and handed out to students.    

I am going to give my students an equation bubble and have them solve it on their white boards.  When they solve the problem they get to pop the bubble!   So excited to try this next year.  I am going to make a whole box of equation bubbles ready to go.

Any other ideas for these equation bubbles?