Lesson Plan Template

Part 1: “The What

Goals/Objectives:

Mathematical Ideas or Concepts:

 Students will see numbers as composed of other numbers and can recognize patterns of
repeated addition and multiplication
 Students will be made aware of the commutative property - a group of quantities
connected by operators gives the same result whatever the order of the quantities
involved, and will see flexibility and patterns in numbers
 Students will understand the relationship between odd and even numbers, and
recognize the patterns with regards to adding and multiplying combinations of odd/even
numbers

Mathematical Practices:
 MP1: Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them
o “Make conjectures about the form and meaning of the solution and plan a
solution pathway rather than simply jumping into a solution attempt”
 Students will most likely have to use trial and error to check which
numbers between 10 and 20 can be made with 5 and 3.
 MP3: Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others
 “They make conjectures and build a logical progression of statements to
explore the truth of their conjectures.”
 The task asks students to prove or disprove an argument and explain
their reasoning
 Students may have discussions about how even and odd numbers add
together to make other numbers, and notice what patterns there are with
numbers they can find relationships between
 MP8: Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning
 “Mathematically proficient students notice if calculations are repeated,
and look both for general methods and for shortcuts.”
 Students may begin to notice patterns in their work and extend this
reasoning to solving the problem

PA Core Standards

 CC.2.1.3.B.1: Apply place value understanding and properties of operations to perform

multi-digit arithmetic
 CC.2.2.3.A.4: Solve problems involving the four operations, and identify and explain
patterns in arithmetic.
 CCSS.MATH.CONTENT.3.OA.D.9: Identify arithmetic patterns (including patterns in the
addition table or multiplication table), and explain them using properties of operations.
For example, observe that 4 times a number is always even, and explain why 4 times a
number can be decomposed into two equal addends.

Eligible Content
  M03.A-T.1.1.2: Add two- and three-digit whole numbers (limit sums from 100 through
1,000) and/or subtract two- and three-digit numbers from three-digit whole numbers
 M03.B-O.1.1.1: Interpret and/or describe products of whole numbers (up to and
including 10 × 10)
 M03.B-O.3.1.5: Identify arithmetic patterns (including patterns in the addition table or
multiplication table) and/or explain them using properties of operations

The Task:

Miss Crystal/Miss Sophie is getting hungry, and decides to go to McDonalds for some Chicken
McNuggets. She sees on the menu she can only get nuggets in packs of 3 or 5, but she wants
more than that. Miss Crystal/Miss Sophie realizes she can get 6, 8, and 10 chicken nuggets if
she buys more than one pack.

She also says she can get any number of chicken nuggets between 10 and 20. Is she right or
wrong?

Extension: What other amounts of chicken nuggets can she get? Are there any numbers of
nuggets she can’t get if only buying them in packs of 3 and 5?
Miss Crystal/Miss Sophie dropped her calculator, and now she can only get four buttons to
work. The only buttons that work still are the 3, 5, + and = buttons. While playing around with it,
she decided she could still make the numbers 6, 8, and 10. Is she correct?

She also says she can make all the numbers between 10 and 20. Is she right or wrong?
Extension: What other numbers could she make?

Why this is a worthwhile task:

This task is low floor, high ceiling and encourages different ways of thinking in approaching and
solving it. Students will build upon their prior knowledge of repeated addition, and hopefully
make connections to multiplicative reasoning to solve the problem more effectively. They may
also need to work through the frustration of only having limited tools (numbers and symbols) to
work with. This problem can encourage students to use their instrumental knowledge of addition
to help them build relational understanding of numbers. We hope they will begin to see that
numbers can all be built upon one another or decomposed, and have many similar properties.

Unpacking the Math:

The students in our classes have been focusing on learning multiplication since the beginning of
the school year, so for around three months. They initially learned how multiplication works by
exploring through repeated addition and skip counting in order to see the connections between
addition and multiplication and truly understand the process of multiplying numbers. This
problem is unique because in order tTo solve itthis task, students only really need basic addition
skills, however the task encourages students to find patterns and use multiplicative reasoning to
solve the problem more effectively and push their mathematical work to higher level thinking.
Using the OGAP Framework, the problem starts at the additive strategy of repeated addition,
but can easily be heightened to become early transitional, with students realizing they can build
up the numbers to make larger numbers. According to Chapin and Johnson, repeated addition
is the way most students are introduced to multiplication, and this method is most often used for
equal grouping problems (Chapin and Johnson 2006). This is why it is important for students to
develop multiplicative reasoning, because not all multiplication math tasks they encounter will
involve equal grouping. StudentsThey should be able to solve the first part of the problem
easily, and use what they’ve discovered to complete the rest of the problem.

We are hoping that students see the relationship between addition and multiplication, but they
may have some difficulty due to the fact that they may think only in terms of addition because of
the way in which the problem is stated. They also have yet to learn about factors and multiples,
which could help them conceptualize the problem more effectively. They might also have the
misconception that they can only make even numbers, because the first addition equations they
can make (3+3, 5+3 and 5+5) all equal even numbers.

Initially, we had decided to use the context of a calculator for this problem. This idea posed
questions about whether or not students would be familiar with how to use a calculator, and
whether or not we would have to introduce what a calculator was before starting the problem.
Overall, we thought this would take away from the ultimate goal of the mathematical task, which
is to utilize multiplicative reasoning within a context where additive reasoning is highlighted. This
led to our decision to keep the numbers in our problem the same, but switch the context to
purchasing chicken nuggets.

The students in our classes have not used calculators during math or any other subject
throughout the school year so far and after conferring with our classroom teachers we found out
that the students may not be familiar with calculators and how to use them, which could make
the problem much more difficult for students to grasp if they don’t understand the context. Even
though they won’t actually need to use a calculator as a tool for solving the problem, the
problem still requires them to understand how a calculator works. However, the context is not
integral to the problem, and if necessary we can still explain the problem in a different way and
students should still be able to solve it.

Anticipating student strategies:

Anticipated strategies: Representation:

Additive strategy: Using addition only 6: 3 + 3

8: 3 + 5
10: 5 + 5
11: 3 + 3 + 5
12: 3 + 3 + 3 + 3
13: 3 + 5 + 5
14: 3 + 3 + 3 + 5
15: 5 + 5 + 5
16: 3 + 3 + 5 + 5
17: 3 + 3 + 3 + 3 + 5
18: 3 + 5 + 5 + 5
19: 3 + 3 + 3 + 5 + 5
20: 5 + 5 + 5 + 5
Early transitional strategy: Using addition and building up/seeing 6: 3 + 3
patterns in the addition (ex. Doubling, adding groups of 10) 8: 3 + 5
10: 5 + 5
11: 3 + 5 = 8
→ 8 + 3 = 11
12: 3 + 3 = 6
→ 6 + 6(3 + 3) =
6 + 6 = 12
13: (5 + 5) = 10
→ 10 + 3 = 13
And so on...

Multiplicative: Using addition and multiplication, potentially showing 6: 3 + 3

understanding of known or derived facts, commutative property, 8: 3 + 5
doubling and halving, and powers of 10 10: 5 + 5
11: (3 x 2) + 5
12: (3 + 3 = 6) x 2
13: 3 + (5 x 2)
14: (3 x 3) + 5
15: 3 x 5
And so on...

Materials and preparation

Materials:
 Written copies of the problem for each student
 Paper and pencils (multiple pieces of paper per student to encourage showing all their
work)
 White board and whiteboard markers and eraser
 Calculator to show students to make sure they understand the problem context, but not
for students to use in aiding them in solving the problem

Preparation:
 Select 4 or 5 students
 Print out task and gather materials
 Make sure students write their names on each paper

Classroom arrangement and management issues

 Students will be working in an area directly outside of the classroom, most likely utilizing
two tables so two kids can sit at each table
 We will read the problem out loud to students, clarify what the problem is asking if
students have any questions, and then hand out a printed copy of the problem along
with pencils
 We will set up norms before sending students off to work individually, making sure the
expectations for behavior are clear

Part 2: The Lesson Plan

1. Before (Launch)
Establishing norms:
 Voices should be silent or low when speaking with others
 Come to teacher if you have a question or need help but try to solve on your own first
 Students should work individually
o Explain that this is not an assessment, and we want to understand student
thinking and that we want to see the different ways students might think about
the problem
Introducing the task:
 Begin by explaining what the students will be doing
o A mathematical task that will cause them to think outside of the box and use
different strategies to solve
o Work individually on it at first, but then come together as a group to discuss the
different strategies for solving it
 Read the problem out loud
 Ask a student to explain what the problem is asking them in their words
 Scaffold if students do not understand the context of the problem
o Discuss how McDonalds only sells chicken nuggets in packs of a certain number
and customers can’t buy any amount of nuggets they want
 As a group complete the first part of the problem (“Miss Crystal/Miss Sophie realizes she
can get 6, 8, and 10 chicken nuggets”)
o Ask students first – how is this possible?
o If students are unsure, eExplain how she could buy two packs of three to have 6
nuggets, a pack of five and pack of three to have 8 nuggets, and two packs of
five to have 10 nuggets
 Give students a piece of paper with the problem on it
 Then let them explore!
o We don’t want to frontload much math talk because we want students to explore
on their own, instead we want to scaffold students as they are working by walking
around and pushing their thinking (asking prompting questions, drawing their
attention to patterns, etc)

2. During (Explore) - there should be adequate time for students to work on the task;
students might work in small groups, pairs, or independently

 Students will work independently on the problem and show their thinking,
 We will circulate and ask:
o What patterns are you noticing?
o Could you represent that in a different way? (ex. 5 + 5 + 5 + 5 = 5 x 4)
o How could you solve this problem more efficiently?
 We will pay attention to whether students are using additive, early transitional, or
multiplicative strategies for solving to aide in facilitating the discussion and take
notes as we observe them working to know how to strategically call on students
during the discussion
 The problem itself lends to differentiation with the types of strategies students
can use, but if they solve the problem quickly we have an extension, and can
also ask students to create their own “packs of nuggets” problem
 o If students are struggling we can first make sure they understand what the
problem is asking, and then assist them in solving and seeing connections
between numbers

3. After (Discuss and wrap-up) - end with a whole group sharing of strategies and
discussions of important mathematical ideas

 Have students pair up to share what answers they got and their strategies with each
other first
 Then bring them together as a whole group and ask them what each student did and
how their strategy was similar or different to their partners
 We will have a whiteboard for recording student strategies to show other students and
draw connections between different strategies (in particular strategies showing the
connection between repeated addition and multiplication if students come up with
multiplication strategies)
 If no students think about the problem in terms of multiplication, we will attempt to move
the conversation toward discussing the connection between addition and multiplication
by asking questions such as:
o How would the problem change if we could use multiplication?
o Can we create the same numbers by adding packs of nuggets that we could by
multiplying them?
 Extend the discussion by asking students which numbers of nuggets are
impossible to make? Try and get them to realize that it is possible to make every
number past 7, and if they understand that ask if they can explain why
 Discussion moves:
o Revoicing and recording student strategies
o Ask students to restate someone else’s reasoning
o Ask students to apply their own reasoning to someone else’s reasoning
o Prompt students to add on to other students’ thinking
 If it comes up or there is extra time, discuss odd and even numbers and how they
are related to the problem
 We will end the discussion by mentioning how many different strategies there are
that all lead to the same answer, and how we can use what we’ve already
learned to build onto our further thinking (use OGAP progression to try and move
students toward higher level strategies)
 To close, ask students what they learned and whether they might solve the
problem differently if they were to do it again in order to solve it more effectively

Formative Assessment (used to inform your instruction)

 Videotape students working
 Have students write down all their work, regardless of whether it’s right or wrong
 Look for students to see patterns in numbers and draw connections between repeated
addition and multiplication

Accommodations
 Too challenging: reword the problem or do the first part(s) with them, provide prompts or
hints to move them forward
 Too easy: have them complete the extension and come up with their own version of the
problem