Patterns In Math Standards: Where Are They

Teaching Mathematics | 0 comments

A question that I get asked a lot is why aren’t patterns in my standards?

Watch the video or read the transcript below:

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Where The Pattern Standards Are

The first thing to know is that there are a couple of very important pages in the Common Core Standards that shifted patterns somewhere else. So whether you’re a Common Core state or not, it kind of played a role in even your own state standards. If you’re not familiar with it, the Common Core State Standards have a couple of pages in the very beginning that is called the Standards for Mathematical Practice.

Those standards, there are eight of them, are where the patterns got shifted to. Now if you want more information about the Standards of Mathematical Practice, I’ve already done a couple of posts about them and so make sure to check those out for more information to get more info if you’re not familiar with them (see links at top of the post).

For now, I just want to talk about why they got moved over there. The main reason is because looking for and using patterns is something that should be done at every single grade level.

The Standards of Mathematical Practice are things that kids should be doing. They’re like mathematical habits that we want kids to be doing from kindergarten all the way through.

We don’t want patterns just in kindergarten or just first grade. There are things that kids need to be looking for at every grade level. If you take a look at the Standards for Mathematical Practice it’s Practice #7 and #8 that talk about looking for and using repeated reasoning and looking for patterns.

Now the hard part of those mathematical practices is that they’re kind of written in general terms for kindergarten all the way through grade 12. And so if you want a little bit more detail, there was a wonderful document that was created that was called the elaborations of the standards of practice. And they were for kindergarten through 5th grade.

Like what do these actually look like for a kindergarten classroom? Because sometimes they’re written in a way that makes it hard to know how that really applies to your grade level. Something that you may want to check out is my blog post about the standards of mathematical practice and the elaborations that are specifically for elementary school.

How To “Do” Patterns

The big part that I want you to understand about patterns is that you may not have specific standards at your grade level, but that does not mean that we shouldn’t have kids looking for patterns. It’s just not something that we’re doing specific lessons on.

Pattern work is something that we should be doing every single day. We want kids looking for repetitions inside of mathematics and then using those to help them look at those patterns and use those patterns to help them solve problems.

So, if your state standards do not have patterns, you’ve gotta still be helping kids look for and use patterns because it is a huge part of the Standards of Mathematical Practice. And even if your state is not using those they’re just great mathematical habits that we want kids to get into. Alright, I hope that this helped you build your math mind so that you can go build the math minds of your students.

Have a great day!

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As you start off the school year, I want you to keep in mind what is really important as we're trying to teach mathematics to our students.