Moving Past Concrete Thinking

Moving Past Concrete Thinking

            As an opener, I asked my classes what is the Universal Language?  Most replied “English!” immediately and one said “Spanish?” as I let silence fill the room a bit longer.  I must admit, I nearly laughed. 

            Moving on, I replied, “no one receives the prize today because math is in fact the Universal Language”, and they stared back in puzzled dispositions.  I then transitioned into translating verbal numerical expressions into algebraic expressions by stressing the importance of being fluent in this Universal Language, known as math.  Quickly, while I had their attention and I wanted their best time, that first ten minutes, I had a chart created on the new promethean board prior to class labeled with only headings.  It looked as follows:

OPERATION	VERBAL EXPRESSION	ALGEBRAIC EXPRESSION
+
-
×
÷

                       

            In addition, I passed out an empty chart to everyone.  As one may predict, I was   setting up the class to fill out the chart as a group.  I had intentions on providing their children   with a visual.  Because adolescents have difficulty processing information in the   form of thinking, grasping concrete ideas to thinking an abstract fashion, I wanted to help their brain organize the ideas and overcome this barrier.  This scaffolds their thinking to organize their thinking patterns, and considerately connects ideas together thoroughly.  In other words, to fully understand the concepts, not just memorize a few facts for the test. 

            By separating the operations into groups, I achieved my goal and provided the class with an interactive experience they enjoyed, as did I.

More Later-------------------------------