Alley Alligator likes to eat big numbers! Yum!

Many educators have heard of the greater than/less than alligator. Above is a song that can be used to help teach younger students in K-2nd grade how to solve these equations. Alley likes to eat the bigger number so the symbol will always have its "mouth" open to the bigger number. When the number is the same, Alley can not decide which one to eat so she eats both. This is where you would have the equal sign between both numbers with eyes and teeth drawn on. This gets students use to doing these types of problems. When helping students to remember the names of the sign, mention that you read the symbol like you would a sentence from left to right. For example the smaller end comes first on less than and the larger and wider end comes first on greater than.

How can math be useful?

We use math everyday whether it is adding up bills or seeing what amount we need for a recipe. When students get into upper level math like geometry they may begin to wonder what is the purpose of the subject. If a teacher can show a student how useful knowing the volume of something or being able to calculate the length of a house using the Pythagorean theorem then they can better show students a connection and usefulness for math in their own lives especially as adults. 

How can differentiation help with math?

It is inevitable that a teacher at some point or many times have a class that has strugglers and advanced students. It is important to meet the needs of all students so using differentiation helps in that respect. While one group may be learning the difference between coins, another group may be already learning how to count the coins. A teacher always has to keep the instruction going no matter where the students are. It would have made a good difference for me if it was used when I was in school. 

Pros and cons of assessments

I believe that assessments are very useful in helping give teachers and students feedback on how well students are doing. It can show what level students are on and whether or not they need to pass to the next level or need additional help. I liked knowing if I did well or not. Assessments can, however, not be completely accurate and can take time to show a teacher whether or not their approach is working or needs to be improved.

Why National Council of Teachers of Mathematics standards?

NCTM has standards that could be very useful in a variety of subjects. I enjoyed learning Algebra the most because I got the content much easier than other standards. Since algebra dealt a lot with computation that was I understood how to do better. It seemed like I encountered reasoning and proof more than other standards because in a lot of math I had to show work to prove how I came up with the right answer. These standards are important because they can show students different lessons that they can use later in life as well a be useful to them in other subjects. 

www.nctm.org/ 

How I was taught mathematics through the years

When I was in school, mathematics was taught in a very monotone way. The classrooms always seemed pretty quiet because the teacher was usually the only person talking and moving around in math. Teachers expected all students to be on the same level. Students were all assessed in the same way. One good thing about learning math back then was that there seemed to be more time given to students to learn about certain math topics. Learning about math seems to go pretty fast these days.