K-3 Span

Second Grade

Because there are multiple parts to solving this problem, there were multiple
points that errors could be made. Student A said the answer to step 1 was 18, while
Student B said it was 8. This is a misunderstanding of the mathematical process on the
part of Student A. Cut off means to subtract, but this student added instead. With
teacher guidance and by using a tape diagram and number sentence, Student A saw this
error and completed step 1 correctly.
In step 2, the students had varying answers to what their number sentence should
be. Student B said it should be 16-8, but Student A said it should be 16+5. Again, this is
a misunderstanding of the mathematical process, but it could also be a concept issue.
When asked where he got the 5 from, Student A responded that it was in the word
problem. After teacher prompting, Student A realized that 5 should not be part of the
answer to step 2, but had trouble seeing where the 8 was coming from. Student B
explained how he got the number sentence 16+8 and then Student A seemed to
understand.
In this situation, there is a need to go over vocabulary and how it relates to the
mathematical process. For example, the conversation could go something like this - cut
off would mean what operation? What do we do when we cut something? What does
together mean? What operation could we use to show this meaning? It may seem

simple, but putting these words that they probably already know into math operations
may make more sense to them.