The problem of practice that our intervention targeted was student’s ability to engage with and make meaning of mathematical text. We selected this problem based on our experiential knowledge of students in high school and students early on in their college career. Everyone in our group, in one way or another, had experienced working with a multitude of students who struggled to read and make sense of a mathematical textbook. We also recognized that, when students get stuck when working on a math problem, they oftentimes do not have the skills to read through and examine their textbook for information that could help get them “un-stuck”. Knowing this, coupled with knowing that making meaning of mathematical text (be it a textbook, web page, pdf document, etc) is vital for a student to survive in a college math classroom, we felt this problem was a necessary problem of practice in support of a student’s successful transition to college. After further examination and discussion, our more specific problem of practice centered around the use of anticipation guides as a way to engage students in making meaning from mathematical text.
The CCSS that relate to our problem of practice are based out of the Standards for Mathematical Practice. The first standard that relates to our problem is SMP #1 “Making sense of problems and persevering in solving them” as this directly relates to the required tenacity and growth mindset necessary for students to be willing to make a guess and then work to find evidence to either support or refute that guess. The other mathematical practice that our problem of practice supports is SMP #3 “Constructing viable arguments and critiquing the reasoning of others” as they are asked to construct a viable mathematical argument citing information from their chosen piece of text.
