Best Practices in Mathematics ECE 7540

1
Best Practices in MathematicsECE 7540

• By Carol, Jenny, Laura and Monna

2
The Way It Was!

• Dont question why just regroup.
• I never did understand Math.
• Just memorize your facts and the procedures.
• Learn the rules of math.
• Math is meant to be hard.
• Only a few are good at math anyway.
• Only a few can understand math.
• These misconceptions are still believed to be
  true today in the United States.
• Many people actually believe that they are not
  capable of doing math!

3
Does It Have To Be This Way?

• NO!
• Today we have a better understanding about mental
  functions
• such as the ability to think, learn, reason,
  remember, and
• problem solve.
• Knowing this, gives us the ability to work more
  affectively with
• our students in helping them understand
  mathematics.

4
Performance Task

• The sorting machine at the Skittles Factory in
  Atlanta
• has broken down. However, work must go on! The
• bags must have all five colors of skittles. So,
  ladies,
• we need to manually check each bag of skittles.
  Your
• task is to make sure that each bag has all five
  colors
• of skittles.

5

• Please follow Ms. Hessons directions to
• successfully help the Skittles Factory to
• correctly package their candy. Be on the look
• out for someone or something that might
• attempt to sabotage your job! Thank you for
• your assistance during this very crucial time!

6
2000 NCTM Standards

• There are six major principles that the 2000 NCTM
  standards
• are based on. They are
• Equity
• Curriculum
• Teaching
• Learning
• Assessment
• Technology
• These six major principles are applied to the ten
  standards for
• grades K-12

7
Qualities of Best Practice in Teaching Mathematics

• Math is not a series of separate skills but
  rather an interconnected set of ideas.
• The goal of teaching math is to make sure that
  all students have a deep understanding of the
  concepts so they can apply them in real life
  situations.
• All students should have a thorough understanding
  of math concepts to be able to apply various
  strategies to problem solve.

8

• There are five basic processes that build an
  understanding of
• Math.
• making connections
• using reasoning and developing proofs
• problem solving
• creating representations
• communicating ideas

9
BEST PRACTICES

• This book is strongly against rote memorization
  of basic math
• facts. Before students can memorize their facts,
  they must first
• have a solid understanding of numbers and
  concepts. Students
• must have many successful experiences using the
  five
• processes.
• However, many teachers still encourage their
  students to
• memorize their facts so they can recall them
  quickly. With this
• method, students do not have to think. They
  practice their
• facts without any regard to number relationships.
• Where do you stand on this?

10
FYI

• Some educators in the field of mathematics claim
  that
• memorizing tradition algorithms in K-4 can be
  harmful.
• One reason given is that children will give up
  ways of thinking about quantity that make sense
  to them and try to work out problems in ways that
  they do not understand.
• Another reason given is that traditional
  algorithms
• unteach place value. Students stop thinking
  about the positions of numbers and treat them as
  single digits.
• Example Write down the three and carry the
  one.

11
Interesting Piece of Information

• Asian students are taught very differently than
  our
• students to count. Our students count ten,
  eleven,
• twelvetwenty. Asian students count ten, ten-
• one, ten-two, ten-three..two-tens. This method
• supports place value thinking.