May Journal Article

In this article(Promoting equity through reasoning), published in Teaching Children Mathematics, the students are asked to work together and collaborate to find the best possible solutions. The teacher tool the time to walk amongst the groups of students and ask questions that helped widen the students understanding about how to approach the problem. The use of manipulatives (Cuisenaire rods) was an asset that the teacher had the students work with. The use of the Cuisenaire rods was a good tool for the students to use because it gave them an example in front of them to work and find different solutions. The students that were working with the Cuisenaire rods were part of an after school program to help them understand how to go about looking at the class’s material. The after school program incorporated 24 students that were African American along with Latino. The main focus of the program was for the students to focus and build upon their own sense of mathematical thoughts. The students were working together to come up with their solution. Several representations were used in each student’s explanations and were used to back up their claims and prove to the other students. The author’s main focus for the teaching portion was for other teachers to make use of different tasks. Also, teachers must give the students choices that will be easy for them to relate to. The choices will give the students more of an opportunity to explain to their classmates why and how they went about their reasoning. Group work amongst the students is highly encouraged as this will help make the material more public and bring about more class discussion.

I found this article interesting and a great tool/asset that I could use throughout my future career. This article helped me understand the meaning of promoting equity through reasoning. I can see myself implementing some of the author’s ideas on this subject in my future classrooms as long as the students that I am working with will benefit from these methods.

Mueller, M. F.; Maher, C. A. Promoting equity through reasoning. Teaching Children Mathematics, Volume 16, Issue 9, Page 540. Retrieved from: http://my.nctm.org/eresources/article_summary.asp?URI=TCM2010-05-540a&from=B