Cluster: Mathematical practices

Standard: Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them. Mathematically proficient students start by explaining to themselves the meaning of a problem and looking for entry points to its solution. They analyze givens, constraints, relationships, and goals. They make conjectures about the form and meaning of the solution and plan a solution pathway rather than simply jumping into a solution attempt. They consider analogous problems, and try special cases and simpler forms of the original problem in order to gain insight into its solution. They monitor and evaluate their progress and change course if necessary. Older students might, depending on the context of the problem, transform algebraic expressions or change the viewing window on their graphing calculator to get the information they need. Mathematically proficient students can explain correspondences between equations, verbal descriptions, tables, and graphs or draw diagrams of important features and relationships, graph data, and search for regularity or trends. Younger students might rely on using concrete objects or pictures to help conceptualize and solve a problem. Mathematically proficient students check their answers to problems using a different method, and they continually ask themselves, “Does this make sense?” They can understand the approaches of others to solving complex problems and identify correspondences between different approaches.

Degree of Alignment: 3 Superior (1 user)

Cluster: Mathematical practices

Standard: Attend to precision. Mathematically proficient students try to communicate precisely to others. They try to use clear definitions in discussion with others and in their own reasoning. They state the meaning of the symbols they choose, including using the equal sign consistently and appropriately. They are careful about specifying units of measure, and labeling axes to clarify the correspondence with quantities in a problem. They calculate accurately and efficiently, express numerical answers with a degree of precision appropriate for the problem context. In the elementary grades, students give carefully formulated explanations to each other. By the time they reach high school they have learned to examine claims and make explicit use of definitions.

Degree of Alignment: 3 Superior (1 user)

Cluster: Apply geometric concepts in modeling situations

Standard: Apply geometric methods to solve design problems (e.g., designing an object or structure to satisfy physical constraints or minimize cost; working with typographic grid systems based on ratios).*

Degree of Alignment: 3 Superior (1 user)

Cluster: Understand ratio concepts and use ratio reasoning to solve problems

Standard: Use ratio reasoning to convert measurement units; manipulate and transform units appropriately when multiplying or dividing quantities.

Degree of Alignment: 3 Superior (2 users)

Cluster: Reason quantitatively and use units to solve problems

Standard: Choose a level of accuracy appropriate to limitations on measurement when reporting quantities.*

Degree of Alignment: 3 Superior (1 user)

Cluster: Apply and extend previous understandings of operations with fractions to add, subtract, multiply, and divide rational numbers

Standard: Solve real-world and mathematical problems involving the four operations with rational numbers. (Computations with rational numbers extend the rules for manipulating fractions to complex fractions.)

Degree of Alignment: 3 Superior (2 users)

Cluster: Draw, construct, and describe geometrical figures and describe the relationships between them.

Standard: Solve problems involving scale drawings of geometric figures, including computing actual lengths and areas from a scale drawing and reproducing a scale drawing at a different scale.

Degree of Alignment: 2.5 Superior (2 users)

Cluster: Analyze proportional relationships and use them to solve real-world and mathematical problems

Standard: Use proportional relationships to solve multistep ratio and percent problems. Examples: simple interest, tax, markups and markdowns, gratuities and commissions, fees, percent increase and decrease, percent error.

Degree of Alignment: 2.5 Superior (2 users)

Cluster: Mathematical practices

Standard: Use appropriate tools strategically. Mathematically proficient students consider the available tools when solving a mathematical problem. These tools might include pencil and paper, concrete models, a ruler, a protractor, a calculator, a spreadsheet, a computer algebra system, a statistical package, or dynamic geometry software. Proficient students are sufficiently familiar with tools appropriate for their grade or course to make sound decisions about when each of these tools might be helpful, recognizing both the insight to be gained and their limitations. For example, mathematically proficient high school students analyze graphs of functions and solutions generated using a graphing calculator. They detect possible errors by strategically using estimation and other mathematical knowledge. When making mathematical models, they know that technology can enable them to visualize the results of varying assumptions, explore consequences, and compare predictions with data. Mathematically proficient students at various grade levels are able to identify relevant external mathematical resources, such as digital content located on a website, and use them to pose or solve problems. They are able to use technological tools to explore and deepen their understanding of concepts.

Degree of Alignment: 2 Strong (1 user)