Concept-rich Mathematics Instruction


Book Description

Presents an instructional approach that helps students in every grade level understand math concepts so they can apply them on assessments, across the curriculum, and outside of school. Provides teaching practices and lesson ideas that give students a stronger foundation for reasoning and problem solving.




Key Concepts in Mathematics


Book Description

"Includes a large number of user-friendly examples that integrate mathematics content and process standards. The step-by-step guidance and explanations in each chapter are beneficial."-Melissa Miller, TeacherRandall G. Lynch Middle School, Farmington, AR "Great activities that are exploratory in nature. A valuable resource."-Carol Amos, Teacher Leader and Mathematics CoordinatorTwinfield Union School, Plainfield, VT Increase students' mathematics achievement with rich problem-solving lessons and activities that are aligned with NCTM standards! Helping teachers envision how math standards can be integrated into the secondary classroom, Key Concepts in Mathematics, Second Edition presents engaging activities and ready-to-use lessons aligned with NCTM content and process standards. This user-friendly book by mathematics educator Timothy J. McNamara is filled with a generous collection of lessons for each of the ten NCTM standards, with many activities that address multiple standards, and numerous practical suggestions for extending the lessons beyond the curriculum. In addition, this updated resource combines standards-based mathematics and technology by incorporating TI-73 Explorer(tm) and TI-83 Plus graphing calculator applications and programs. Each chapter offers: Ready-to-use lessons, hands-on activities, practical suggestions, and an abundance of "good problems" Suggestions for integrating multiple topics and concepts in each lesson Strategies to strengthen student engagement, understanding, and retention by building connections among mathematics topics This exciting guide delivers exactly what is needed for today's standards-based math classroom!




Concept-Based Mathematics


Book Description

Give math students the connections between what they learn and how they do math—and suddenly math makes sense If your secondary-school students are fearful of or frustrated by math, it’s time for a new approach. When you teach concepts rather than rote processes, you show students math’s essential elegance, as well as its practicality—and help them discover their own natural mathematical abilities. This book is a road map to retooling how you teach math in a deep, clear, and meaningful way —through a conceptual lens—helping students achieve higher-order thinking skills. Jennifer Wathall shows you how to plan units, engage students, assess understanding, incorporate technology, and even guides you through an ideal concept-based classroom. Practical tools include: Examples from arithmetic to calculus Inquiry tasks, unit planners, templates, and activities Sample assessments with examples of student work Vignettes from international educators A dedicated companion website with additional resources, including a study guide, templates, exemplars, discussion questions, and other professional development activities. Everyone has the power to understand math. By extending Erickson and Lanning’s work on Concept-Based Curriculum and Instruction specifically to math, this book helps students achieve the deep understanding and skills called for by global standards and be prepared for the 21st century workplace. "Jennifer Wathall’s book is one of the most forward thinking mathematics resources on the market. While highlighting the essential tenets of Concept-Based Curriculum design, her accessible explanations and clear examples show how to move students to deeper conceptual understandings. This book ignites the mathematical mind!" — Lois A. Lanning, Author of Designing Concept-based Curriculum for English-Language Arts, K-12 "Wathall is a master at covering all the bases here; this book is bursting with engaging assessment examples, discussion questions, research, and resources that apply specifically to mathematical topics. Any math teacher or coach would be hard-pressed to read it and not come away with scores of ideas, assessments, and lessons that she could use instantly in the classroom. As an IB Workshop Leader and instructional coach, I want this book handy on a nearby shelf for regular referral – it′s a boon to any educator who wants to bring math to life for students." — Alexis Wiggins, Instructional Coach, IB Workshop Leader and Consultant




High School Mathematics Lessons to Explore, Understand, and Respond to Social Injustice


Book Description

Empower students to be the change—join the teaching mathematics for social justice movement! We live in an era in which students have —through various media and their lived experiences— a more visceral experience of social, economic, and environmental injustices. However, when people think of social justice, mathematics is rarely the first thing that comes to mind. Through model lessons developed by over 30 diverse contributors, this book brings seemingly abstract high school mathematics content to life by connecting it to the issues students see and want to change in the world. Along with expert guidance from the lead authors, the lessons in this book explain how to teach mathematics for self- and community-empowerment. It walks teachers step-by-step through the process of using mathematics—across all high school content domains—as a tool to explore, understand, and respond to issues of social injustice including: environmental injustice; wealth inequality; food insecurity; and gender, LGBTQ, and racial discrimination. This book features: Content cross-referenced by mathematical concept and social issues Downloadable instructional materials for student use User-friendly and logical interior design for daily use Guidance for designing and implementing social justice lessons driven by your own students’ unique passions and challenges Timelier than ever, teaching mathematics through the lens of social justice will connect content to students’ daily lives, fortify their mathematical understanding, and expose them to issues that will make them responsive citizens and leaders in the future.




Mastering Math Manipulatives, Grades 4-8


Book Description

Put math manipulatives to work in your classroom and make teaching and learning math both meaningful and productive. Mastering Math Manipulatives includes everything you need to integrate math manipulatives—both concrete and virtual—into math learning. Each chapter of this richly illustrated, easy-to-use guide focuses on a different powerful tool, such as base ten blocks, fraction manipulatives, unit squares and cubes, Cuisenaire Rods, Algebra tiles and two-color counters, geometric strips and solids, geoboards, and others, and includes a set of activities that demonstrate the many ways teachers can leverage manipulatives to model and reinforce math concepts for all learners. It features: · Classroom strategies for introducing math manipulatives, including commercial, virtual, and hand-made manipulatives, into formal math instruction. · Step-by-step instructions for over 70 activities that work with any curriculum, including four-color photos, printable work mats, and demonstration videos. · Handy charts that sort activities by manipulative type, math topic, domains aligned with standards, and grade-level appropriateness.




Teacher Learning of Ambitious and Equitable Mathematics Instruction


Book Description

Drawing on sociocultural learning theory, this book offers a groundbreaking theory of secondary mathematics teacher learning in schools, focusing on the transformation of instruction as a conceptual change project to achieve ambitious and equitable mathematics teaching. Despite decades of research showing the importance of ambitious and equitable teaching, few inroads have been made in most U.S. classrooms, and teacher learning in general remains undertheorized in most educational research. Illustrating their theory through closely documented case studies of secondary mathematics teachers’ learning and instructional practices, authors Horn and Garner explore the key conceptual issues teachers are required to work through in order to more fully realize ambitious and equitable teaching in their classrooms. By theorizing teacher learning from a sociocultural perspective and focusing on instructional practice, the authors make a unique contribution to the field of teacher learning. This book offers researchers, scholars, and teacher educators new theoretical and methodological tools for the elusive phenomenon of teacher learning, and provides instructional leaders and coaches with practical examples of how teachers shift their thinking and practice.




Teaching Mathematics Meaningfully


Book Description

Making mathematics concepts understandable is a challenge for any teacher--a challenge that's more complex when a classroom includes students with learning difficulties. With this highly practical resource, educators will have just what they need to teach mathematics with confidence: research-based strategies that really work with students who have learning disabilities, ADHD, or mild cognitive disabilities. This urgently needed guidebook helps teachers Understand why students struggle.Teachers will discover how the common learning characteristics of students with learning difficulties create barriers to understanding mathematics. Review the Big Ideas. Are teachers focusing on the right things? A helpful primer on major NCTM-endorsed mathematical concepts and processes helps them be sure. Directly address students' learning barriers. With the lesson plans, practical strategies, photocopiable information-gathering forms, and online strategies in action, teachers will have concrete ways to help students grasp mathematical concepts, improve their proficiency, and generalize knowledge in multiple contexts. Check their own strengths and needs. Educators will reflect critically on their current practices with a thought-provoking questionnaire. With this timely book--filled with invaluable ideas and strategies adaptable for grades K-12--educators will know just what to teach and how to teach it to students with learning difficulties.




Rethinking Mathematics


Book Description

In this unique collection, more than 30 articles show how to weave social justice issues throughout the mathematics curriculum, as well as how to integrate mathematics into other curricular areas. Rethinking Mathematics offers teaching ideas, lesson plans, and reflections by practitioners and mathematics educators. This is real-world math-math that helps students analyze problems as they gain essential academic skills. This book offers hope and guidance for teachers to enliven and strengthen their math teaching. It will deepen students' understanding of society and help prepare them to be critical, active participants in a democracy. Blending theory and practice, this is the only resource of its kind.




Big Ideas Math


Book Description




Transitioning to Concept-Based Curriculum and Instruction


Book Description

A cutting-edge model for 21st century curriculum and instruction How can you spot a thinking child? Look at the eyes: they’ll light up, signaling that transformative moment when your student has finally grasped that big idea behind critical academic content. If experiences like this are all too rare in your school, then you need a curriculum and instruction model that’s more inquiry-driven and idea-centered. Now. H. Lynn Erickson and Lois Lanning demonstrate how, through concept-based curriculum, you can move beyond superficial coverage and lower-level skills practice to effect intellectually engaging pedagogy, where students engage in problem finding and problem solving. New insights include: How to design and implement concept-based curriculum and instruction across all subjects and grade levels. Why content and process are two different (but equally important) aspects of any effective concept-based curriculum. How to ensure students develop the all-important skill of synergistic thinking. We’re all looking for the best curriculum and instruction model to meet the changing demands of the 21st century. This is it. "With the onset of the Common Core and new national content standards, concept-based learning is now more crucial than ever. Erickson and Lanning are ′ahead of the curve′ in providing teachers and curriculum leaders with rich instructional strategies to meet these challenging standards. This is an essential book for planning tomorrow’s curricula today." Douglas Llewellyn, Educational Consultant and Author of Inquire Within, Third Edition "Powerful teaching engages minds with powerful ideas. At its core, such transformative teaching is neither transmission of information nor practice with inert skills. Rather it is a careful choreography between a mind and an idea such that the mind comes to own the idea in a form that is true to the discipline and expansive for the learner. Erickson and Lanning teach teachers to be choreographers of learning—understanding both what makes content worth knowing and how to engage young minds with that content in ways that extend their capacities to understand it at a deeper level, use it, transfer it, and ultimately create with it." Carol Ann Tomlinson, Ed.D., Chair of Educational Leadership, Foundations, and Policy Curry School of Education, University of Virginia