Clip 2/20: Multiplying and Factoring Polynomial Expressions Pre-Lesson Part 2

Overview

Continuing their pre-lesson conversation, SVMI coach Pam Brousseau asks Melissa Nix to connect her intentions for the lesson to the Teaching for Robust Understanding of Mathematics (TRU Math) framework. Melissa describes her use of a formative assessment and anticipates that the lesson will provide an example of cognitive demand, “challenging for some, and more easily accessed for others.”

She connects to students’ prior work with the distributive property and anticipates that “multiplying with polynomials in general, and certainly working backward to look at the product and then trying to find the factors, is going to be one shift more challenging.” Pam asks Melissa to describe her lesson sequencing; Melissa responds that her number talk will prime students to be ready for engagement with different examples, more intensive peer work in pairs and quartets that allow digging into ideas, sharing out, and an exit ticket capturing their understandings.

Teacher Commentary

Melissa Nix

I was intentional with the design of the number talk that I started the kids out with, and I tried to then gradually make the work a little more challenging, trying to let them go back to, How does what you are coming up with right now in this explorative part of the lesson. ... How does that relate to what we’ve already looked at, and what can you pull on — what can you go back to in your mental bank or resources, or what we've already looked at, to say, like, "Oh, that's what is connected,” or why that doesn't make sense, or “That's why it's not 2x and it's not x squared.”