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Article: Incredible Equations Develop Incredible Number Sense.
- Article from:
- Teaching Children Mathematics
- Article date:
- November 1, 2000
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2000 National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, Inc. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Sandy, a second grader, created the following "Incredible Equation" on 22 January:
8 X 8 - 65 + 11 + 1/2 + 7 - 1/2 + 5 = 22
This equation involved many of the mathematical concepts that Sandy was exploring. She incorporated squares, negative numbers, fractions, and three different operations into her equation. Creating Incredible Equations helped Sandy learn new mathematical concepts and skills; the activity also gave her teacher concrete and substantial evidence of the depth of Sandy's understanding.
In this article, we describe the activity called Incredible Equations (Burk et al. 1988), show how it is managed in the classroom, and highlight ...