Clip 5/21: Standard 7: Look for & Make Use of Structure Using Fractions 2A

Mathematically proficient students look closely to discern a pattern or structure.

On the second day of the learning segment, Michelle Makinson's students return to their sentence starters and discussion sheets. They examine their work, looking for a set of cards that they matched with a particularly strong justification that they can “save-the-planet-level defend.” Pairs then share their justifications with the whole class, and Michelle challenges her students to communicate precisely and to evaluate their own justifications. She uses a “turn and talk” strategy to generate suggestions to improve the clarity of a justification. She models academic language: “Does anyone have a different strategy for enhancing the justification?” Students consider their own justification cards to make improvements: “Is all the evidence you need there? If not, add it.” This clip also relates and standard 6 (attend to precision).

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