Argues that assessment does not have to be a formal score in the grade book; rather it can be an informal process used by the teacher to direct the lesson. Provides a real-world activity for assessing students' understanding of percents and fractions where students use ratios, proportions, and percents to solve problems involving the comparisons…

Discusses the development of Math Attack, a project designed to make middle school mathematics engaging, fun, and useful to middle school students by involving them in problems solving. Describes the effect of the project in helping students learn to think and communicate mathematically and helping teachers develop skill and confidence. (JPB)

Tested effects of a structured intervention in teaching children to represent addition and subtraction. Found significant differences between two study groups in terms of affecting the addition and subtraction operations and ability to determine which operation was appropriate. Results suggest children's exploration of real world situations should…

Describes a consumer-math-skills project in which students make geometric shapes using pretzel sticks and gumdrops, then start a shop to sell them. This requires counting costs, pricing items, setting up shop, using money, making change, and understanding profits. Students reflect on the experience and write lists of the math they used to create…

Touts using the schoolyard for teaching mathematics. Mathematics is a way of describing the world and its patterns; schoolyards are especially suited to concept application and problem solving. Mathematics in a natural setting also allows students and teachers to meet learning objectives in more than one subject area. Includes math activities for…

Students set up a pizza parlor and choose a name for the parlor, menus and drinks, the number of customers they will serve, and numbers of table settings and ingredients they will need. Students choose work roles in the parlor, and student customers pay the parlor with paper money they designed. Includes full activity instructions, pizza recipe,…

Parents' math and science-promotive behaviors predict children's activities and interest in these courses. (Contains 1 table and 2 figures.)

Children's early mathematical experiences play an enormous role in the development of their understanding of mathematics, and serve as a foundation for their cognitive development. In this descriptive study, we observed the naturally occurring mathematical activities engaged in by thirty-nine 3-year-olds, equally divided by race/ethnicity and…

Analysis of variance (ANOVA), a technique included in many introductory statistics courses, analyzes the relationship between a quantitative dependent variable and one or more independent qualitative variables. The nature of the relationship is expressed in a model with unknown parameters. Many textbooks emphasize the mechanics of the technique…

More than 2 decades have passed since Geoffrey Saxe's first visit to Papua New Guinea, when he began his inquiry into the highly idiosyncratic counting system of Oksapmin's people. As evidenced by his account, a quarter of a century is a period long enough to make historical shifts visible. The point of departure for this commentary on…

The Mobius strip, torus, and Klein bottle are used to graphically and analytically illustrate the differences between orientable and non-orientable surfaces. An exercise/laboratory project using the non-orientable Boy surface is included. (Contains 11 figures.)

Based on a proven instructional model distilled over years of research, this book focuses on five essential pedagogy standards for guiding teaching practice in classrooms with diverse students, including English learners. Providing key indicators for each standard along with the theoretical rationale and "best practice" strategies, the book offers…

Algebra is no longer just for college-bound students. After a widespread push by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) and teachers across the country, algebra is now a required part of most curricula. However, students' standardized test scores are not at the level they should be. NCTM's seventieth yearbook takes a look at the…

ProbLab is a probability-and-statistics unit developed at the Center for Connected Learning and Computer-Based Modeling, Northwestern University. Students analyze the combinatorial space of the 9-block, a 3-by-3 grid of squares, in which each square can be either green or blue. All 512 possible 9-blocks are constructed and assembled in a "bar…

The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) recommended the use of calculators in the classroom in 1989. While calculators are more readily available in classrooms today than they were a few years ago, the recommendation is rarely followed in elementary grades. One of the reasons for this is a lack of appropriate classroom materials.…