Algebra Forum IV San Jose, CA May 22, 2012 Compiled and Presented by

1. Teaching and Learning Fractions with Conceptual Understanding Algebra Forum IV San Jose, CA May 22, 2012 Compiled and Presented by April Cherrington Joan Easterday Region 5 Region 1 Susie W. Hakansson, Ph.D. California Mathematics Project

2. Description Fractions from a number line approach represents a shift in thinking about fractions, moving beyond part-whole representations to thinking of a fraction as a point on the number line. Included in this session will be the following: rationale, comparing and ordering, and justification.

3. Outline for Today • (20 minutes) Introduction • (90 minutes) Breakout session • (20 minutes) Reflection

4. Introduction • CaCCSS-M Task Force • Conceptual understanding • Order problems • Cognitive level • Language issues • Why number line? • Fraction progressions • Standards for Mathematical Practice • Challenges students face • Overview of break out session

5. Fractions Task Force • Greisy Winicki-Landman, Chair • Nadine Bezuk • April Cherrington • Pat Duckhorn • Joan Easterday • Doreen Heath Lance • Pam Hutchison • Natalie Mejia • Gregorio Ponce • Debbie Stetson • Kathlan Latimer

6. Demands of CaCCSS-M “… almost all teachers are placing a lower priority on student understanding in recent years, ….” “… the sort of high quality PD that an really affect teachers in their ability to produce students who understand is very, very difficult to do, and very few people have much clue about how to do it.” Scott Farrand

7. Fraction Sense: Comparing • 8/15 > 1/2 (?) • 7/22 > 1/3 (?) • 6/11 > 7/15 (?) • 7/8 > 8/9 (?) Solve these problems mentally without using algorithms. Justify your thinking.

8. Cognitive Demand Spectrum Memorization Procedures Without Connections to understanding, meaning, or concepts Procedures With Connectionsto understanding, meaning, or concepts Doing Mathematics Tasks that require engagement with concepts, and stimulate students to make connections to meaning, representation, and other mathematical ideas Tasks that require memorized procedures in routine ways

9. Why Is English So Hard? • The soldier decided to desert his dessert in the desert. • Upon seeing the tear in the painting, I shed a tear. • After a number of injections, my jaw got number. • A minute is a minute part of a day.

10. Why Is English So Hard? • There is no egg in eggplant and no ham in hamburger. • How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? • Did you say thirty or thirteen? • Did you say two hundred or two hundredths? • Did you say fifty or sixty?

11. Dual Meaning Words

12. The Guinevere Effect 9th and 10th graders’ responses • Tom had 5 apples. He ate 2 of them. How many apples were left? • A. 10 B. 7 C. 5 D. 3 (100%) • Guinevere had 5 pomegranates. She ate 2 of them. How many pomegranates were left? • A. 10 (22%) B. 7 (24%) C. 5 (23%) D. 3 (31%)

13. Key Strategies for English Learners • Access prior knowledge • Frontload language • Build on background knowledge • Extend language • Be aware of multiple meanings of words • Have students Think, Ink, Pair, Share (TIPS)

14. Teachers learn to amplify and enrich--rather than simplify--the language of the classroom, giving students more opportunities to learn the concepts involved. Aída Walqui, Teacher Quality Initiative

15. Why Number Line? “Hung-Hsi Wu attempts to bring coherence to the teaching and learning of fractions by beginning with the definition of a fraction as the length on the number line (1998).  This approach eliminates the ‘conceptual discontinuity’ (2002) encountered moving from work with whole numbers to fractions; it also brings coherence to the various meanings of fractions and allows for both conceptual work to operations on fractions (2008). Wu asserted that ‘The number line is to fractions what one’s fingers are to whole numbers ...”

16. Basic Assumptions about the Number Line and Its Use • Numbers go on infinitely in both directions. • On a conventional horizontal number line, the numbers increase from left to right. • The numbers to the right of zero are the positive numbers, and those to the left are negative numbers. • 0 is not positive nor negative.

17. Basic Assumptions about the Number Line and Its Use • Using the number line, there are basically two types of tasks: • Given a point on the number line, assign a number to it (its coordinate) • Given a number, place it as a point on the number line. • The length of the interval from 0 to 1 is called the unit and it determines the distance between every pair of consecutive integers on the line.

18. Basic Assumptions about the Number Line and Its Use • Fractions can be placed on the number line by partitioning the length from 0 to 1 into d equal parts. One of these parts has the length 1/d; n of those parts has the length n/d. The fraction n/d is the point at the end of the segment of length n/d. • Given the unit interval, each point on the number line can be associated to infinitely many fractions: the name will depend on the partition chosen. All of these fractions are equivalent.

19. WHY THE Number Line? • It serves as a visual/physical model to represent the counting numbers and constitutes an effective tool to develop estimation techniques, as well as a helping instrument when solving word problems. • It constitutes a unifying and coherent representation for the different sets of numbers (N, Z, Q, R), which the other models cannot do.

20. WHY THE Number Line? • It is an appropriate model to make sense of each set of numbers as an expansion of other and to build the operations in a coherent mathematical way. • It enables to present the fractions as numbers and to explore the notion of equivalent fractions in a meaningful way.

21. WHY THE Number Line? • The number line, in some way, looks like a ruler, fostering the use of the metric system and the decimal numbers. • It fosters the discovery of the density property of rational numbers. • It provides an opportunity to consider numbers that are not fractions.

22. Common Core Standards Mathematics Grades 3, 4 and 5 Number and Operations - Fractions • Grade 4 • Extend understanding of fraction equivalence and ordering • Build fractions from unit fractions by applying and extending previous understandings of operations on whole numbers. • Understand decimal notation for fractions, and compare decimal fractions. • Grade 3 • Develop understanding of fractions as numbers • Grade 5 • Use equivalent fractions as a strategy to add and subtract fractions. • Apply and extend previous understandings of multiplication and division to multiply and divide fractions.

23. Common Core Standards Mathematics Grades 6 and 7 Number and Operations - Fractions • Grade 6 • Apply and extend previous understandings of multiplication and division to divide fractions by fractions. • Grade 7 • Apply and extend previous understandings of operations with fractions to add, subtract, multiply, and divide rational numbers.

24. CaCCSS-M: Mathematical Practice • We will focus two of the Standards for Mathematical Practice: • Reason abstractly and quantitatively • Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others

26. Reason Abstractly and Quantitatively DO STUDENTS: • Explain a problem to themselves, determine what it

27. Construct Viable Arguments and Critique the Reasoning of Others • Use multiple representations (verbal descriptions,? Standards for Mathematical Practice

28. Question What are some of the challenges that students have with fractions?

29. Overview of Breakout Sessions • Appropriate grade level problem • Twelve (12) cards • Videos of students working with 12 cards • Human Number Line activity • Reflection

30. Slides for Breakout

31. Breakout Reflection • What mathematics did you use in the activities? • How did your reasoning and explaining support and expand your understanding of the mathematics? • How did these activities provide access to all students? Give specific examples.

32. Return to main room

34. Part IB: Equivalent Fractions, Comparing and Ordering Fractions • Use the structure of the number line and benchmarks to determine value of the “?” of each number line strip. • With a partner agree on the value of the “?” and share your strategies.

35. Ordering 12 Cards Order Number Lines Explain Reasoning 1. 2. . . . . . . . 12. Hardest Easiest CCSS-M Task Force: CAMTE, CDE, CISC, CMC, CMP M2 A3

36. Human Number Line: Ordering • Divide into groups of 10. • Each of you will be given a card. • One person will place himself/herself on a line to establish a point. • Each subsequent person is to place himself/herself to the left, right, or in between the existing numbers to maintain proper order. • This task focuses on order and not proportionality.

37. Reflection: Think, Ink, Pair, Share • How has this experience with these activities expanded your concept of fractions? • How will this inform your instruction in the classroom? • How will you amplify and enrich the language to support English learners?

38. SOLVE THIS WITHOUT USING ALGEBRA OR a/b = c/d What is the ratio of men to women in a town where two-thirds (2/3) of the men are married to three-fourths (3/4) of the women?

45. Goals for Institute • Support English learners in mathematics with high cognitive demand tasks. • Become familiar with the CaCCSS-M, particularly the Standards for Mathematics Practice. • Gain a conceptual understanding of the number line as a big idea in the CaCCSS-M. • Use the number line in working with fractions.

46. Reflection • How will we support English learners in mathematics with high cognitive demand tasks? • What did we learn about the CaCCSS-M, particularly the Standards for Mathematics Practice? • What understanding of the number line as a big idea in the CaCCSS-M did we gain? • How will we use the number line in working with fractions?

47. Delivery of Instruction • Engage students in high cognitive demand tasks. • Assess by walking around (ABWA). Provide access to the language of mathematics. • Allow for discourse (Think, Ink, Pair, Share--TIPS) • Set high expectations and increase expectations • Allow students to explore why—metacognition

48. Acquiring the Knowledge • Become familiar with the content and academic language of your lesson and possible misinterpretations. • Frontload the academic/mathematics/English language of the mathematics content. • Amplify and enrich the language. • English language learners are trying to catch a moving target. • Be aware of how your students interpret the academic and mathematics language.

49. Putting This Together When you design instruction, you start with the cognitively demanding mathematics you want students to learn. You gain an in-depth understanding of the content. Then you incorporate the most effective instructional practices to meet the needs of your students. You access prior knowledge, build background knowledge, and extend language.

50. Putting This Together You instinctively know to frontload the language, to ask questions of students, to have students think, ink, pair, share, to increase discourse, to increase student engagement, to assess, etc. This process becomes second nature to you. You are addressing the needs of ALL students, particularly English learners.