Reinforce the mathematical concept of proportions using various colored jelly beans. Purchase very small baskets from a craft store and make one proportional word problem for each basket. Number the baskets and keep them at the front of the room to avoid students being able to see how many jelly beans are in each. The goal of the problems is to find how many of each colored candy are in the baskets and the total number of jelly beans in each basket. An example of a puzzler problem may be "Basket number one contains three red jelly beans, a number of yellow jelly beans that is twice as many as the number of red candy and one-third as many purple jelly beans as the number of yellow candy. How many red, yellow and purple jelly beans are in the basket?" (The answer is three red [given], six yellow and two purple jelly beans.
Prior to the activity, devise a number of coordinates to graph that, when finished, will appear as an Easter egg. When graphing the points on the x"" and "y" axes, instruct students to use designated colors for a specific number of coordinates so that when the egg picture is complete, the picture will also display colored decorations on the egg such as stripes, polka dots or zig-zags. Display the Easter graphs in a paper basket on a mathematical-themed bulletin board.
Review basic operations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication and division of two-digit numbers with an Easter egg hunt. Place one word problem inside various plastic eggs and arrange the class into groups of three or four. Give each group an introductory clue to find an egg and when the problem in that egg is correctly solved, hand each group another clue used to find the next egg. Repeat until each group has solved 10 word problems. The group that finishes first is the winner.
Integrate a creative art activity into the Easter math lesson by encouraging students to construct paper or tissue flowers of varying colors into a bouquet. Instruct students to calculate the percentage of orange, red, blue and yellow flowers as well as the flowers with green leaves versus those without leaves. Regroup the flowers to alter the answers to percentage questions to extend the activity.