Cross-Curricular Planning

I know when I was in Teacher's College, I didn't have a lot of chances to plan outside of the box. If we were in Math, we were planning a Math lesson. If we were in Science, it was Science... and so on. But when you think about it, a lot of our lessons can easily be tied together so that not only are we checking off boxes and cementing knowledge from other areas of the curriculum, but we're showing that subjects like math don't only exist in math class -- it's out there for us to experience anywhere and anytime!

I haven’t specifically had the opportunity to do cross-curricular activities involving math in my own teaching yet, as I was limited in what I could do in teacher’s college during my practicums, and now am usually fairly limited at what I am left to teach as an occasional teacher.  I have had the fun of bringing geometric shapes into art with students, and that was a fun activity, but I could see some sort of cross-curricular activity where students need to use math in order to get the numbers for a persuasive writing/media assignment dealing with a topic from science, social studies or social justice.

Let's face it though, tying subjects together – especially bringing math into other subjects – makes math seem more like a real world skill that students need. Math becomes more than something that math teachers and mathematicians only use, and something everyone uses in their everyday lives.

It also makes math more fun and hands-on, especially if some sort of creative activity is tied to it. Geometry can just feel like a bunch of shapes that no one needs to know the names of, but if you go and do something neat and artistic with those shapes, they become more real and concrete.

Grade 2s working on their Geometric Abstraction

While looking for cross curricular lesson plans, I accidentally came across an article about a teacher who was able to incorporate math along with physical fitness and writing! I thought it was a neat that the kids got so excited about running, which made them excited about writing about it, and at the same time were better understanding fractions (1/4, 1/2, 1/3 miles compared to a full mile). 
There's a teacher who took her own interest, made it her students' interest, and got them excited about not only fitness! She got them excited about writing and math too! 

An interesting lesson I found online was one for Grade 4 dealing specifically with financial literacy, but pulling in language, math, social science and science:

At the end of these lessons, students will know, understand and/or be able to identify the pros and cons of mining versus recycling.
a) Students explain that mining and purifying minerals is an expensive process
b) Students demonstrate mining provides good paying jobs to Canadians
c) Students identify the two of the most important minerals used in building our society are iron and aluminum

Students are using a lot of prior learning in various subjects in order to determine the financial implications.

Let's not forget a personal favourite of mine, using musical notes to help us understand fractions. Or is it fractions helping us understand musical notes?

https://www.pinterest.ca/pin/99360735508065217/

Do you plan cross-curricular lessons?
What have been your most sucessful cross-curricular lessons?