On+going+content+reflection

The content areas of geometry and measurement are vast and rich with important mathematical ideas. One challenge that the instructors of this course always face is deciding which topics within these content areas to focus on in our course. For years, we have used the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics’ //Principles and Standards for School Mathematics// (PSSM) to guide our decisions. In doing so, we feel we have identified content that is not only important for you to learn as a student of mathematics, but also is very relevant to you as a future teacher of elementary or middle school mathematics.

One of the challenges of a course such as Math 1510 where so much of the development of important ideas is done in the midst of small or whole group discussion is keeping good records of what those major ideas are, how they were developed, and to what other ideas they connect. This ongoing assignment will not only help you to do this, but also help you to further connect the major ideas of this course to the expectations outlined in the PSSM for a particular grade band (Pre-K – 2, 3 – 5, or 6 – 8). Thus the completed course reflection should serve as a valuable resource tool as you prepare for in-class assessments in this course and eventually, as you prepare to teach. It will, in addition to the course pack you have, become your “textbook” for the course.

Described below is the format I'd like you to use when developing your course content reflections.

There are four goals for the geometry standard and two goals for the measurement standard that are common across all the grade bands: Geometry Measurement
 * Analyze characteristics and properties of two- and three-dimensional geometric shapes and develop mathematical arguments about geometric relationships
 * Specify locations and describe spatial relationships using coordinate geometry and other representational systems.
 * Apply transformations and use symmetry to analyze mathematical situations
 * Use visualization, spatial reasoning, and geometric modeling to solve problems
 * Understand measurable attributes of objects and the units, systems, and processes of measurement
 * Apply appropriate techniques, tools, and formulas to determine measurements

Separate your page into these seven goals; indicate clearly on the page which grade band on which you are focusing. Within each standard, identify related major concepts or big ideas that we developed in the course and clearly connect them to particular grade band expectations. In addition, for each major concept or big idea that you connect to expectations, indicate how we developed this idea/concept in class (what activities did we do).

This task should be done in an on-going fashion, updating your page at least once a week as we progress through the course, and equally sharing the updates with your partner. For example, you and your partner could update the page every other week so that each week there are additions by someone. You may be as creative as you want on the development of your page but creativity is not awarded any points. WHAT YOU COMMUNICATE through the page entries is what will be assessed based on your **clarity, completeness (being explicit), and correctness (your accuracy).** For each entry, critique it based on those 3 criteria. Ask yourself if a student in M1500 could clearly understand what you are communicating about the mathematics.