In this lesson, students use the Understand, Plan, Solve, and Evaluate (UPSE) problem-solving model to first identify and organize relevant information, and then devise and carry out a plan to solve one-step mathematics word problems with a missing addend. The lesson was designed with English learners (ELs) in mind and includes instructional strategies designed to make linguistic and content input comprehensible: a focus on vocabulary, manipulatives, visuals, cooperative learning, anchor charts, graphic organizers, technology applications, and sentence stems/frames.

Students will work in groups and solve one-step word problems using a protocol to guide their thinking.

Students will be divided into four groups and work on their assigned task to become an expert. They will match vocabulary terms with definitions and examples, use the “Pass the Pen” strategy to create and solve equations or inequalities, or write a real-world problem for an equation given. The experts will then teach these concepts to their peers.

As students rotate through engaging learning stations, they utilize concrete objects, pictorial models, mnemonic devices, and strip diagrams to solve real-world, two and three-digit subtraction word problems, with and without regrouping.

Students will compare fractional parts in a real-world situation using play dough as a model for pizza.

Students will work collaboratively through a fictitious real-world scenario to solve one‐step and multi‐step word problems. The lesson will involve solving addition and subtraction within 1,000 using a variety of strategies based on place value.

Students determine which expression is a truth or a lie by generating equivalent expressions. 

Students are introduced to solving one-variable, one-step equations using addition and subtraction through models and hands-on activities. The students will learn the substitution method of checking answers.

Students will engage in an activity that allows them to explore the different parts of percents: part, whole, and percent, and develop conceptual understanding of percents through the Concrete, Representational, Abstract (CRA) method of instruction.

Students will work collaboratively to apply and use digits, value, greater than/less than and base 10 knowledge to communicate numbers up to 1200 with a Halloween theme.

Students will collaborate to explain verbally how to solve percent proportions and scaling while showing their thinking.

Students participate in a teacher-created three-act task in order to solve math word problems. They reactivate their prior knowledge and determine the question to solve the main problem during Act One. Act Two engages students in a differentiated, rich task. During Act Three, students compare and discuss their work with peers outside their original groups. 

Students rotate through four stations, collaboratively utilizing different strategies and manipulatives to analyze, explore, solve, and generate real-world culinary problem situations. 

Students will be able to use concrete and pictorial models to compose and decompose numbers with place value.

In learning stations, students prepare for a birthday party by using their knowledge of place value to compose, decompose, and represent numbers using standard, word, and expanded forms.

Students will use manipulatives and a number path to identify numbers one less than or more than a given number.

Students work collaboratively with a variety of different manipulatives to compose and decompose numbers in more than one way.

Students will participate in whole-group and small-group instruction as they collaborate and use manipulatives, visuals, and hands-on activities to explore fractional parts. Ultimately, students will understand that when dividing a whole into fractions, the smaller the fractional part, the greater the number of parts, and the larger the part, the fewer the number of parts.

Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) Vertical Alignment

Click below to learn about the TEKS related to the unit and Research Lesson. The highlighted student expectation(s) is the chosen focus for the Research Lesson.