So I am the worst, and I mean the WORST at estimating party needs.  In the past I have ordered pizza for my classroom and ended up with 6 extra pizzas.  Part of the problem is that I’m not very good at estimation (including how much less pizza an average third grader will eat compared to myself), but also I rarely practice this skill.

This year for our holiday party, it COMPLETELY slipped my mind to ask parents to volunteer to bring snacks, napkins, drinks, etc…somehow the day of the party was only 2 days away and I was in a bind.  As we all know, no one has tons of cash to throw around for holiday parties anyway.

So I was determined to NOT screw this one up.  I was going to go in to the grocery store with a calculator, the number of students in my class, and a tight budget. I felt good about this trip, I knew that it would be easier because I was calculating 1 candy cane per student, a handful of pretzels per student and 1 capri sun per student. I even found some napkins…on sale!

So get this! After the party I ended up with 2 leftover candy canes, 4 extra capri suns and a stack of napkins.

Why I have been historically terrible at this is sort of a mystery to me. It’s not like it is complex math, rather it involves using simple math in a complex way. This was not how I was taught math growing up, so I have to actually practice this to get better at it! It is why I created the Party Planning Awesomeness Project for my students.  It is the reason that I create all of the things I do, because I feel that students really do need to be able to practice these skills.

Check it out! We actually did this prior to our last math test, with a class goal. If we got 94% as a whole class average, we’d earn the party that the students voted for.  And…they did it! I now have another party to shop for, but this time the student did all the math!

Thanks to these ladies: 4mulaFun, Fourth Grade Studio, Teaching to Inspire in 5th, AND MissMathDork for the opportunity to link up! Apparently this is a monthly thing that they do, being new to blogging for only a few months, I had no clue how awesome this is.