2.2 Indeterminacy: moving from specific unknowns to variables
When learners are introduced to symbolic representations, they often represent a quantity that has a specific but unknown value. The learner may be asked to find this value.
Two examples of such problems are missing number problems and Think of a Number (THOAN) problems.
Activity 7 Missing number problems
Allow 10 minutes
Have a go at the following problems.
Activity 8 Reflecting
Allow 5 minutes
What makes these algebra problems, rather than simply number problems?
What do you expect learners to learn from these problems?
Now watch the two videos that discuss these questions.
OpenLearn - Teaching mathematics
Except for third party materials and otherwise, this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Licence, full copyright detail can be found in the acknowledgements section. Please see full copyright statement for details.