Showing Equality

We are trying to finish up a few math things before school comes to an end.  Today we began a short unit on equality.  I started the lesson by reading a story called Equal Shmequal to the students.  It was about some animal friends who want to play tug-of-war, but they can't figure out how to make equal teams.  After listening, the students used balance scales and cubes to represent the different animals (1 cube=mouse, 2 cubes= turtle, 3  cubes=rabbit, etc.)  Their task was to explore as many different ways as possible to show the animals balancing (Example:1 rabbit=1 mouse + 1 turtle).  The pictures below show the students working together.  (It was also Hat Day today!)