Recursive Relay

Today, I finished my lesson today about 15 minutes early, so I had some time to kill. I made a recursive relay years ago, and I thought I would bring it back again. 

I grouped together 4 students. I created cards with 2nd, 3rd, 4th, and 5th. The first student received the 2nd card, the second student got the 3rd card, and so on. The first student also received a small whiteboard and marker. 

On a small whiteboard, I wrote down the first recursive equation and the first term. I placed it under the document camera and let the students GO! (I didn't want to write the equation on the big whiteboard because I didn't want any groups to get a head start.) So the first student had to find the 2nd term then pass the whiteboard on to the next person to find the 3rd term, and so on. I had the last person (5th term) to raise their hand when they were finished. 

I don't have my students in rows - my classroom is setup in stadium seating. So, if any students were having trouble, the next person helped them out! 

I still checked every group just to make sure that all students understood. By the 4th round, I just gave each group a little prize since they did the work, but didn't happen to be the fastest. This is just a fun short activity if you have some extra time. 

I have my activity set up so that you can easily see the equation with all terms. It makes it much easier to check when the group is finished. 

Here is my activity: Recursive Relay 

~RJ