Comparing Iowa Core to the National Council for the Teachers of MathA basic comparison by Julie Townsend-Leavell

The National Council for the Teachers of Math

(retrieved January 20, 2013 from http://www.nctm.org/standards/content.aspx?id=7564)

The following information will be provided, taken from the NCTM website, to help define the learning of mathematics.

What is NCTM?

“The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) is the world's largest organization dedicated to improving the teaching and learning of mathematics from prekindergarten through high school. NCTM is a nonprofit, nonpartisan education association with nearly 90,000 members and more than 230 Affiliates in the United States and Canada. NCTM's mission is to ensure the highest-quality mathematics education for all students. NCTM was founded in 1920.”

Understand numbers, ways of representing numbers, relationships among numbers, and

number systems (retrieved January 20, 2013 from http://www.nctm.org/standards/content.aspx?id=7564)

Grades 9–12 Expectations: In grades 9–12 all students should–

develop a deeper understanding of very large and very small numbers and of various representations of them;compare and contrast the properties of numbers and number systems, including the rational and real numbers, and understand complex numbers as solutions to quadratic equations that do not have real solutions;understand vectors and matrices as systems that have some of the properties of the real-number system;use number-theory arguments to justify relationships involving whole numbers.

Understand meanings of operations and how they relate to one another

(retrieved January 20, 2013 from http://www.nctm.org/standards/content.aspx?id=7564)

Grades 9–12 Expectations: In grades 9-12 all students should–judge the effects of such operations as multiplication, division, and computing powers and roots on the magnitudes of quantities;develop an understanding of properties of, and representations for, the addition and multiplication of vectors and matrices;develop an understanding of permutations and combinations as counting techniques.

Compute fluently and make reasonable estimates

(retrieved January 20, 2013 from http://www.nctm.org/standards/content.aspx?id=7564)

 Grades 9–12 Expectations: In grades 9–12 all students should–develop fluency in operations with real numbers, vectors, and matrices, using mental computation or paper-and-pencil calculations for simple cases and technology for more-complicated cases.judge the reasonableness of numerical computations and their results.

Iowa Core

The following information is provided and taken from the website to help understand what it means.

Why the Iowa Core(information retrieved January 20, 2013 from http://educateiowa.gov/index.php?option=com_rsticketspro&view=article&cid=1197:why-iowa-core-why-not-just-

duplicate-another-states-standards&Itemid=2457)

“The development of the Model Core Curriculum for high schools was mandated by SF 245, passed in 2005. At that time, it was determined that we would articulate the essential skill sets in literacy, mathematics, and science. Extending it to include social studies and 21st century skills and expanding it to include grades K-8 came about when SF 588 passed in 2007. Now with the passage of SF 2216, full implementation of the Iowa Core is mandated for all public schools and accredited non-public schools. Other state's standards and benchmarks, along with international information, were examined by the Work Teams, which articulated the essential concepts and skill sets. Work Teams quickly determined that no one state system was without limitations or met all of Iowa's needs."

Iowa Core(information retrieved January 20, 2013 from

http://www.educateiowa.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2298&Itemid=4399

)

Mathematics Standards for High School

The high school standards specify the mathematics that all students should study in order to be college and career ready. Additional mathematics that students should learn in order to take advanced courses such as calculus, advanced statistics, or discrete mathematics is indicated by (+), as in this example: (+) Represent complex numbers on the complex plane in rectangular and polar form (including real and imaginary numbers).

Iowa Core(information retrieved January 20, 2013 from

http://www.educateiowa.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2298&Itemid=4399

)

All standards without a (+) symbol should be in the common mathematics curriculum for all college and career ready students. Standards with a (+) symbol may also appear in courses intended for all students. The high school standards are listed in conceptual categories: Number and Quantity Algebra Functions Modeling Geometry

Iowa Core(information retrieved January 20, 2013 from

http://www.educateiowa.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2298&Itemid=

4399)

Statistics and Probability Conceptual categories portray a coherent view of high school mathematics; a student’s work with functions, for example, crosses a number of traditional course boundaries, potentially up through and including calculus. Modeling is best interpreted not as a collection of isolated topics but in relation to other standards. Making mathematical models is a Standard for Mathematical Practice, and specific modeling standards appear throughout the high school standards indicated by a star symbol (★). The star symbol sometimes appears on the heading for a group of standards; in that case, it should be understood to apply to all standards in that group.

Comparison

At first glance, the NCTM is a brief but clear outline of expectations for results in learning math by graduation from high schoolAt first glance, the Iowa Core, only highlighted in this PowerPoint, is a quite complex and highly detailed extenuation of the NCTM

Furthermore

Further inspection reveals that the Iowa Core is more rigorous and has deadlines, goals, and a firmer set of expectations that seem to guarantee student learning basics and beyond for real-life skills that include today’s technological advances, and to prepare students for college and career tracks.

  Resources

http://www.educateiowa.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2298&Itemid=4399http://www.nctm.org/standards/content.aspx?id=7564