About the course
The middle school course is designed to allow teachers to reflect on and connect the Common Core Mathematics Standards to research on how students learn mathematics. The Ten Principles of Thinking Math and the Standards for Mathematical Practice are linked and attention paid to how concepts and skills develop. Using geometry as a starting point, participants explore ways to help students understand linear functions and rate of change with emphasis on linking various ways of seeing the same problem. Practices such as reasoning, constructing viable arguments, precision and looking for mathematical structure combine with the Ten Principles of Thinking Mathematics such as helping students visualize problems, requiring them to discuss and justify their mathematical thinking, using situational problems to connect mathematics to life, and balancing conceptual and procedural knowledge to develop such understanding.
Course Objectives:
• Gain a deeper understanding of today’s rigorous content standards for middle school students, the mathematical practices, and how content and practices intertwine.
• Learn Ten Principles of Thinking Mathematics drawn from research such as tapping intuitive knowledge, helping students visualize and model problems, stressing both concept and procedure, encouraging multiple solution strategies, and building the expectation and ability to reason mathematically and discuss their mathematical thinking.
• Experience strategies applied to specific content: ratio and proportion, fractions, expressions and equations, and linear functions.
• Be immersed in a variety of ways to think about linear functions and rate of change to better support students who think differently and link various ways of seeing the same problem.
• Connect to real life situations to help students see the usefulness of mathematics.