What We Call Middle School Mathematics

By:
Francis Gardella, Hunter College-CUNY

In Press 2024

While the text, Algebra for the Middle Grades (IAP, 2020) addresses the Algebra topics for a middle school mathematics program, What We Call Middle School Mathematics addresses the content of the middle school mathematics program across the grade levels involved. This book strives to have middle school mathematics teachers understand how the mathematics at their individual grade fits into the overall middle school mathematics curriculum.

While doing this, What We Call Middle School Mathematics assists teachers with ideas in teaching topics. In doing this, the text addresses topics through the physical modeling that is often given little focus in a traditionally based text. For teachers, this book not only shows the mathematical content of the middle school but also using models for its teaching. For students, the book has them portray the modeling activities that will assist them in understanding.

In some cases, especially with fractions, the book includes a focus on the basic content from the elementary grades. The goal here is to help teachers understand and deal with the weaknesses in mathematics that many students bring with them to the middle school. The focus on this background is not a review since students, nor anyone else, is able to review what they truly do not understand. While it addresses the mathematics from former grades it does so in a teaching format.

As the reader moves through the chapters on each topic, the overall content for that topic in the middle school can be seen. For 8th grade students, the text would make an excellent compendium of what has been learned in middle school mathematics while setting the stage for topics for re-investigating prior ideas of the topic when necessary.

CONTENTS
Dedication. Acknowledgments. About This Book. CHAPTER 1: How to Move on a Grid. CHAPTER 2: Statistics of the Median. CHAPTER 3: Multiplication and How It Varies. CHAPTER 4: Angles and Shapes. CHAPTER 5: Fractions: The Mathematics of Pieces. CHAPTER 6: How Many Squares Fit? CHAPTER 7: Sharing Unequally and Comparing with Big and Small. CHAPTER 8: Angles and Relationships. CHAPTER 9: Decimals. CHAPTER 10: The Statistics of Sharing Equally. CHAPTER 11: Putting Pieces Together/Taking Pieces Apart. CHAPTER 12: Sometimes Things Are Positive. and Sometimes Things Are Negative. CHAPTER 13: Filling Up Boxes. CHAPTER 14: Comparing Quantities Using 100. CHAPTER 15: Subtracting Integers—First Thoughts. CHAPTER 16: Pythagoras. CHAPTER 17: Probably Yes or Maybe No? CHAPTER 18: Fractions: The Rest of the Story. CHAPTER 19: Subtracting Integers—More Thoughts.