All learning, especially new learning, should be embedded in well-chosen contexts for learning
– that is, contexts that are broad enough to allow students to investigate initial understandings,
identify and develop relevant supporting skills, and gain experience with varied and interesting
applications of the new knowledge. Such rich contexts for learning open the door for students
to see the “big ideas”, or key principles, of mathematics, such as pattern or relationship. This
understanding of key principles will enable and encourage students to use mathematical reasoning
throughout their lives.
Effective instructional approaches and learning activities draw on students’ prior knowledge,
capture their interest, and encourage meaningful practice both inside and outside the classroom.
Students’ interest will be engaged when they are able to see the connections between
the mathematical concepts they are learning and their application in the world around them
and in real-life situations.
Students will investigate mathematical concepts using a variety of tools and strategies, both
manual and technological. Manipulatives are necessary tools for supporting the effective learning
of mathematics by all students. These concrete learning tools invite students to explore and
represent abstract mathematical ideas in varied, concrete, tactile, and visually rich ways. Moreover,
using a variety of manipulatives helps deepen and extend students’ understanding of mathematical
concepts. For example, students who have used only base ten materials to represent
two-digit numbers may not have as strong a conceptual understanding of place value as students
who have also bundled craft sticks into tens and hundreds and used an abacus.
Manipulatives are also a valuable aid to teachers. By analysing students’ concrete representations
of mathematical concepts and listening carefully to their reasoning, teachers can gain
useful insights into students’ thinking and provide supports to help enhance their thinking.4
Fostering students’ communication skills is an important part of the teacher’s role in the mathematics
classroom. Through skilfully led classroom discussions, students build understanding
and consolidate their learning. Discussions provide students with the opportunity to ask questions,
make conjectures, share and clarify ideas, suggest and compare strategies, and explain
their reasoning. As they discuss ideas with their peers, students learn to discriminate between
effective and ineffective strategies for problem solving.
Students’ understanding is revealed through both oral communication and writing, but it is
not necessary for all mathematics learning to involve a written communication component.
Young students need opportunities to focus on their oral communication without the additional
responsibility of writing.
Whether students are talking or writing about their mathematical learning, teachers can prompt
them to explain their thinking and the mathematical reasoning behind a solution or the use of
a particular strategy by asking the question “How do you know?”. And because mathematical
reasoning must be the primary focus of students’ communication, it is important for teachers
to select instructional strategies that elicit mathematical reasoning from their students.