Patterns Rule!

A student asked me, "When are we going to do math?".  I replied, "We are doing math!" 

Math is often thought of as numbers only and operations like addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.  It is also commonly looked at like us adults have learned in school, by using pencil and paper, answering facts, memorization and such.  Today we teach for conceptual understanding.  Some children tell me they know how to multiply and can show on paper that 2 x 6 = 12, but actually have no idea what it means.  2 x 6 means that there are 2 groups of 6 and we ask students to build it and draw it in order to understand it fully. 

Patterning is one unit of math that we cover.  Here are the big ideas:

 

Big Math Ideas:

• Patterns repeat in predictable ways. The pattern core is the smallest part that repeats. We can build a repeating pattern with materials.  We can act it out with actions or make it with sounds.

• Growing/increasing patterns get bigger. Shrinking/decreasing patterns get smaller.

• We can use letters to describe a pattern, like ABABAB or AABCAABC. This is a way to generalize.

• There are other kinds of patterns as well, ones that grow and shrink. Growing patterns get bigger each time. Shrinking patterns get smaller each time.

• We can use manipulatives to build an increasing or decreasing pattern. We can make a pattern rule for an increasing or decreasing pattern.

• Knowing how a pattern changes helps us to “predict down the line”.

• We can use a T-chart to show a skip counting pattern.

• There is a pattern in the even and odd numbers. It’s an ABABAB pattern. When we start at 0 and count by 2’s we say the even numbers. When we start at one and count by 2’s we say the odd numbers.

• When we skip count by a number to say the multiples of that number. Increasing patterns change based on multiples.

 

Big Ideas in Math Across the Grades 1-3 – Carole Fullerton 2013


After reading a story, children worked in pairs to build a repeating pattern with pattern blocks.

Once the students understood increasing patterns, we moved onto growing patterns.  I read, The Tree that Grew to the Moon and the children created trees of increasing ages.  They began with a 1 year old tree and were asked to show how it would grow year to year.  The older children used a t-chart to show the age of their tree and how many blocks they used for each tree.  I then asked them to explain what happened to the tree each year it grew in relation to the number of blocks used.  Here is one example:

 

  Now you understand why after doing an activity like this, I was asked when we were doing math!