I’m thinking that this is a lot like reading comprehension. I don’t really remember learning it… I was amazed when I worked at The New Community School that they’d figured out what many critical comprehension skills were and how to build them up. F’rinstance, to “find the main idea” of a passage, we’d start out giving students lists of words to categorize. Then we’d add the category into the list and they’d have to pick which was the “big idea” word and which were the “supporting detail” words…. etc…
What are the “math comprehension” skills students need? The procedural skills are sort of like the vocabulary and grammar — but there’s so much more to understanding math. I want to figure out how to teach it.
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dgburris
August 3, 2012
What do you think about the mathematical practices in the common core as a place to start thinking about this?
xiousgeonz
August 15, 2012
I really liked an article in the AFT magazine about the Common Core — it pointed out some of the specific differences in teaching things liek fractions and negative numbers. The Common Core focused more on understanding the concepts first — so, if I remember right, negative number operations were taught from a framework of the “oppositeness” of negative from positive, not as a set of procedures. I can’t remember if they supported the idea that you should teach the idea of common denominators for a while — and then get into the convenience of least common denominators, rather than have students wallowing in factor tree procedures while trying to absorb something very new and complex.
I think it would be neat to work with the Common Core on generating lessons — as opposed to drifting off into weird political stuff…