Investigations Blog
Are There Going to Be More Than 20? More Than 50?
Many of us were taught to “estimate” in elementary school. Maybe we were asked how many jellybeans there were in a jar. Or asked to round before finding the answer to a computation problem. But for many of us there was little connection between those activities and actually solving problems. I would argue that estimating — determining what an approximate and reasonable answer might be — should be a part of the process of solving problems. A visit I made to a 1st grade classroom at the end of...
read moreDeveloping Mathematical Language is Hard Work
Using language to effectively communicate one’s mathematical thinking is an important skill—one that is a focus of Math Practice 6: Attend to Precision. Many of us know firsthand that clearly articulating mathematical ideas is challenging work, and that when students use ambiguous, imprecise terms in their explanations, their language can actually get in the way of understanding. Developing precise language is key if we want to students to engage in rich, collaborative discussions in which...
read moreAsked and Answered: Why Ask the Same Question When You’ve Already Gotten a Perfectly Good Answer?
I was watching one of those legal shows on TV the other night. The prosecutor was asking the defendant a version of the same question for the third time. The defendant’s lawyer, getting annoyed, objected: “Asked and answered!” I’ve heard this phrase a hundred times in the (made-up TV) legal context, but this was the first time it struck me how pervasive this idea was in my own mathematics education, and how powerful it still is: If a student has given a perfectly good answer to a math...
read moreWhat Happens When There Are More Than 10?
Imagine you are 6 years old. Or 7. You know you can use your fingers to model subtraction. For example, for a problem where there are 7 grapes and 2 get eaten, you can raise 7 fingers, put down 2, and count how many are left. But what do you do when the problem involves more than 10 things? Take a moment, before looking at the student work and video below. How would you use your fingers to solve a problem about having 12 scissors, and lending 5 to another class? A student I’ll call Miguel is a...
read moreThe Lesson? Students Never Cease to Surprise Me
On a recent visit to a school in a small city in the Midwest, Karen and I joined a class of 5th graders as they learned a game in Unit 3 called Roll Around the Clock. In the previous session, students used a clock to find and name fractions and equivalent fractions. For example, if the minute or hour hand moves from the 12 to 3, it has rotated 3/12 or 1/4 or 15/60 around the clock. Students would use these ideas in this lesson. In this game, players take turns choosing which of two dice to...
read moreHow Do We Support Students in Reflecting on Mathematics?
As I worked with teachers in classrooms this fall, the topic of how to help students reflect on their learning and the learning of others kept coming up. I’m still thinking about how to recognize, encourage, and promote student reflection about math ideas. What traits do reflective students possess? How can a teacher nurture a learning culture where reflection is a natural part? When students engage in math experiences that include time to reflect on their reasoning and the thinking of others...
read moreA Grade 3 Q&A: Why start with multiplication and division?
Question: Why does 3rd grade start with a multiplication/division unit and not addition/subtraction?Answer: We often hear from people who wonder why Grade 3 starts with a multiplication and division unit—just like it did in the 1st edition!—rather than an addition and subtraction unit. As we decided on the sequence of the units in any grade, we considered many different things. The most important was the development of mathematical content within and across grades.In Investigations 3,...
read moreIncomplete, inarticulate, ill-formed, incorrect: Brilliant!
Over the last decade, much of my work has been focused on mathematical argument in the elementary classroom. Observing in our collaborating classrooms, I was struck again and again by how teachers supported students to build on each other’s incomplete ideas. Constructing a mathematical argument is difficult and challenging for elementary students and, therefore, necessarily collaborative. When students are learning what it means to make an argument, not just about the solution to a single...
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