Fraction Tree!

Even though Christmas and the holiday season has already passed, I was delayed in doing this activity due to a snow day the day before break was to begin. {Side note. I never thought I would ever be upset about a snow day, but a day before break, with all of the Christmas parties... horrible day for there to be no school!}

We've just started fractions in the class I co-teach in. My students were thrilled  horrified at the thought of this topic, and to be quite honest, I don't really blame them. I never liked fractions at their age either... but I'm determined to find things that help make sense of fractions.

Giant ugly brown area above was suppose to be gone.. and the stump of my tree was already taken down before I remembered to take a picture.

In the back of my classroom is a bulletin board that I try to keep interactive. {You can see what I've done so far this year in posts here and here.} Well this go around, I made a "Fraction Tree". The ornaments their shape, color, design, the number of them were all part of a fraction review. Students were given a specific item to find. For example: What fraction of the Christmas lights were red? What fraction of the ornaments are round? There were suppose to be presents under the tree and more Christmas-y things around to add to it, but man, December just flew! I had everything hung on the tree with sticky tack, so I could rearrange, take away options, or make the numbers easier/harder to work with depending on the students working in this area at the time.

Still trying to decide what my next bulletin board will be... any suggestions?