Everyday Mathematics &

the Common Core State

1 Standards

1.1 The Content Standards 1.2.4 SMP4 Model with

1.1.1 Rigor mathematics.
Contents
1.1.2 Focus 1.2.5 SMP5 Use appropriate tools
1.1.3 Coherence strategically.
1.1.4 Depth of Knowledge 1.2.6 SMP6 Attend to precision.
1.1.5 Unpacking the Content 1.2.7 SMP7 Look for and make
Standards use of structure.
1.1.6 Useful Mathematics 1.2.8 SMP8 Look for and express
regularity in repeated reasoning.
1.2 Standards for Mathematical
Practice 1.2.9 Standards for Mathematical
Practice in the Everyday
1.2.1 SMP1 Make sense of problems
Mathematics Classroom
and persevere in solving them.
References
1.2.2 SMP2 Reason abstractly and
quantitatively.
1.2.3 SMP3 Construct viable
arguments and critique the
reasoning of others.

Section 1
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The University of Chicago School Mathematics Project (UCSMP) aims to

improve school mathematics across the entire nation. UCSMP’s instructional
materials, classroom research, international conferences, and teacher
development efforts help teachers better prepare all students for college and
career. UCSMP’s elementary curriculum, Everyday Mathematics, provides the
tools elementary school teachers need to meet this long-term goal.
The Common Core also aims to improve school mathematics on a broad scale.
The Common Core is at the center of a nationwide effort to prepare all
students for college and career, an effort that aims at systemic coherence
across instructional materials, teacher development, and assessment.
The goals of Everyday Mathematics and the Common Core are thus closely
aligned. Both aim at developing all students’ mathematical power—their ability
to reason, communicate, and solve problems. Both also aim at fostering
productive dispositions in students—a belief that mathematics is worthwhile,
an inclination to use the mathematics they know to solve problems they face,
and confidence in their own mathematical abilities.

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 For this edition, Everyday Mathematics has been rebuilt from the ground up to
help teachers teach to the Common Core. The authors coupled their
experience developing quality research-based curriculum with a deep
understanding of the Common Core’s standards in order to unpack them for
teachers and students and create useful and effective instructional materials.
The Common Core includes two types of standards: Standards for
Mathematical Content and Standards for Mathematical Practice (SMP). The
content standards specify procedures, concepts, and applications that
students are to master at each grade. The practice standards describe how
students should approach the content specified in the content standard. The
practice standards are the processes and habits of mind students need to
develop as they learn the content standards.

1.1 The Content Standards 2.NBT.2

The Common Core’s content standards are intended to bring greater focus,
coherence, and rigor to school mathematics so that students develop deep
knowledge of useful mathematics.

1.1.1 Rigor
The Publishers’ Criteria, a companion document to the Common Core State
Standards, defines rigor as the pursuit, with equal intensity, of conceptual
understanding, procedural skill and fluency, and applications (National
Governors Association [NGA] Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief
State School Officers [CCSSO], 2013, p. 3). Defining rigor as balance across
skills, concepts, and applications is a significant strength of the Common Core
and a great fit with Everyday Mathematics.
The assessment consortia, PARCC and SBAC, which are developing high-stakes
Section 1

assessments for the CCSS, use similar language in their frameworks for

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designing test items. For example, SBAC calls for tasks to assess the rigor of the
standards by assessing conceptual understanding, procedural skill and fluency,
and applications.
Procedural skill is important for many reasons. Knowing an efficient procedure
affords mathematical power, making it possible to solve a whole class of
problems with a single method. Fluency with a procedure makes it possible to
execute it automatically, which frees up cognitive capacity for higher-level
thinking. And knowing a procedure well makes it possible to connect that
procedure with other procedures and with related concepts in robust
networks of interconnected knowledge that support durable learning and
depth of knowledge.
Conceptual understanding is equally important. Students need to understand
not only how but why. Procedural skill without understanding is inflexible and
unreliable, limited in scope and utility. Understanding concepts and how they
connect to other concepts and procedures is essential to developing deeper
understandings and more advanced procedural skills.
This mutual dependence of conceptual understanding and procedural skill has
been widely recognized for many decades. What has not been so widely
recognized is that applying mathematics is equally important. Much of the
mathematics people learn in school languishes unused, gradually fading

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 from memory. Few people leave school appreciating the incredible utility
of mathematics for solving problems. Among the many reasons for teaching
mathematics, perhaps the most important is its utility, its effectiveness
for modeling the world and solving problems. Knowing concepts and
procedures is of little value if that knowledge cannot be put to use.
Balancing these three aspects of rigor—procedural skill, conceptual
understanding, and applications—has always been fundamental to
Everyday Mathematics.

1.1.2 Focus
Another key feature of the Common Core is its call for a more focused
curriculum, a curriculum that is narrower so that it can be deeper. This
narrowing of the curriculum addresses a dilemma in school mathematics:
There is too much worth teaching.
Decades of research and development in mathematics education have
established that children can learn a great deal of mathematics far earlier than
has traditionally been thought. Indeed, the 1989 curriculum and evaluation
standards from the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics—the
standards that ignited the entire standards movement of the past 25 years—
called for a significant broadening of the school mathematics curriculum.
Topics such as geometry, statistics, and probability were to be taught at earlier
grades than ever before—and the evidence showed that children could indeed
learn that mathematics.
There were problems with the new, broader curriculum, however, the most
important of which was time. Even with an hour or more of mathematics
instruction per day, there is not enough time to teach both traditional topics
and the new topics well. Rather than deep and usable knowledge of a broad

Section 1
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range of elementary mathematics, students could develop superficial and

relatively useless knowledge of that mathematics.
This is the problem that the Common Core’s call for focus is meant to solve.
By narrowing the range of mathematics to be taught, teachers will have more
time to develop deeper, more durable, and more usable knowledge in their
students. In the Common Core, for example, there is no longer a rush for
mastery of traditional paper-and-pencil algorithms for basic arithmetic
operations. The Common Core expectations for those algorithms are later
than has been traditional, so that more time can be devoted to students’
explorations of diverse strategies based on place value and the principles of
the operations. By narrowing the range of mathematics to be taught, more
attention can also be devoted to applications and mathematical practices.
This edition of Everyday Mathematics achieves focus by adhering closely
to the Common Core’s content standards. As the Publishers’ Criteria notes,
focus means focusing on the content standards at each grade (NGA & CCSSO,
2013, p. 3). By any measure, Everyday Mathematics achieves such focus. Every For more information,
activity, every problem, in Everyday Mathematics is tightly connected to the see Section 2.2.1 The Spiral:
content standards, as is shown with the Spiral Tracker, an online tool that How Everyday Mathematics
provides detailed information about Everyday Mathematics and the Common Distributes Learning.
Core. Go Online to Spiral Tracker.

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 Note that focus refers to the content to be taught, not how that content is to
be taught. For example, a spiraling curriculum such as Everyday Mathematics
can be intensely focused by returning again and again to key grade-level
content through distributed exposures and practice, which has been shown
For more information,
see Section 2.2 Design of
effective by decades of research. Focus does not mean three weeks on one
Everyday Mathematics. topic, followed by three weeks on another topic, and so on. Research indicates
that such an approach is not effective for long-term learning and retention.
Nor is such an approach what the Common Core requires.

1.1.3 Coherence
The third key idea in the Common Core’s content standards is coherence, the
systematic arrangement of content in research-based learning progressions
and the weaving together of progressions for different topics in ways that are
mutually supportive.
One difficulty with such an approach, of course, is that research-based
learning trajectories for all topics in the Common Core do not exist. The logical
structure of the mathematics to be learned is clear enough, but the
psychological details of how children’s learning develops over time are not
entirely clear. The Common Core writers and curriculum developers need to
fill in gaps in learning trajectories suggested by research and resolve
contradictions among different research results. A great deal of professional
judgment and design skill is required.
This is an area where field testing and iterative improvement are vitally
important. One cannot build an effective learning trajectory without testing it
any more than one can build an effective automobile without testing it. The
Common Core provides standards and constraints, but only careful
engineering work, which the Everyday Mathematics authors have done for
decades, can yield instructional materials that will work. The careful, research-
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based, and field-tested arrangement of learning goals and activities has long
been a hallmark of Everyday Mathematics.

1.1.4 Depth of Knowledge

The Common Core’s calls for greater focus, coherence, and rigor in school
mathematics all aim at promoting greater depth of knowledge. The idea of
depth of knowledge was not invented at the University of Chicago, but the first
modern, organized attempt to devise a hierarchy of learning objectives was
carried out there by Benjamin Bloom and his colleagues in the 1950s. Bloom’s
Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (1956) organized cognitive behaviors in
six levels: knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and
evaluation. In the decades since Bloom’s original classification, a number of
refinements and alternative formulations have been proposed. Among the
most widely cited hierarchy in recent years has been Norman Webb’s (1999,
2002) depth of knowledge scheme, which organizes mathematical knowledge
into four levels: (1) recall, (2) skill/concept, (3) strategic thinking, and
(4) extended thinking. SBAC uses a Cognitive Rigor Matrix that integrates the
Bloom and Webb models in their design of assessment items and tasks
(Hess, Carlock, Jones, & Walkup, 2009; SBAC, 2012a).
Such hierarchies are founded on the beliefs that some sorts of knowledge are
more basic than others and that mastering lower-level knowledge is necessary

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 but not sufficient for mastering higher-level knowledge. The Common Core is
well aligned with such thinking. Rigor comprises the full range of content, from
facts, procedures, and concepts to applications and non-routine problem
solving. Focus, the Common Core’s narrowing of the curriculum, is explicitly
intended to allow time to reach deeper levels of knowledge. And the coherence
of well-articulated learning trajectories is intended to lead students to ever-
deeper knowledge of unifying ideas in mathematics.
Everyday Mathematics also aims to go deep—and not only through the focus,
coherence, and rigor the Common Core requires. One key advantage of the
Everyday Mathematics spiral design is that students develop depth of knowledge
by repeatedly returning to topics over time, making connections and going deeper
with each return. Depth of knowledge is not something that can be developed all
at once. Developing deep knowledge requires repeated exposure to key ideas in
different contexts and across months or years of time, repeated exposures that a
spiral curriculum such as Everyday Mathematics is ideally suited to provide.

1.1.5 Unpacking the Content Standards 2.NBT.2

The Common Core provides approximately two dozen content standards for
each grade, standards that vary widely in grain size and specificity. Some
standards are tightly focused on a single concept or skill; others comprise a
range of related skills, concepts, and applications. These standards are
embedded in a larger framework of clusters and domains that provide context
and structure. The Common Core’s domains, clusters, and standards provide
guidance for the development of curriculum materials and standardized
assessments, but do not have the level of detail classroom teachers need for
effective instruction, accurate assessment, and targeted differentiation.
Part of the rebuilding of Everyday Mathematics has been unpacking the
Common Core’s content standards into Goals for Mathematical Content (GMC)

Section 1
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that are more useful for assessment and differentiation. Consider, for example,
the Common Core’s first content standard, K.CC.1: “Count to 100 by ones and by
tens” (NGA & CCSSO, 2010, p. 11). This simple standard comprises two different
goals, counting by ones and counting by tens. In order to be able to assess
accurately and differentiate appropriately, Everyday Mathematics distinguishes
these two goals and tracks each one separately.
Each grade’s Common Core content standards are unpacked into 45 to 80
Everyday Mathematics Goals for Mathematical Content (GMC). The standards
and the corresponding GMCs are listed in the back of each grade’s Teacher’s
Lesson Guide. Every instructional item and assessment item in Everyday
Mathematics is linked to one or more of the GMCs.
The GMCs are called out in various places throughout the program, such as in For more information,
each lesson’s Spiral Snapshot and Assessment Check-In and in every unit’s see Section 2.2.1 The Spiral:
Progress Check lesson’s table of content assessed. The digital Spiral Tracker How Everyday Mathematics
displays complete GMC information about every activity. Go Online to the Distributes Learning.
Spiral Tracker.
Constructing an intricately structured program such as Everyday Mathematics
means building fine-grained learning trajectories for the mathematical content
specified in the Common Core. Detailed tracking of that content is necessary
for accurate assessment and effective differentiation. The GMCs are essential
for building such trajectories and carrying out such tracking.

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 1.1.6 Useful Mathematics
Both Everyday Mathematics and the Common Core aim to teach students
mathematics they can use—important mathematical ideas with broad
implications; logically and psychologically coherent mathematics; mathematics
that is balanced across skills, concepts, and applications; mathematics that
is powerful.
But teaching students mathematics they can use doesn’t guarantee that they
will use it. Students also need to come to believe that mathematics is useful.
It is not enough that adults believe the mathematics being taught in school is
important and useful. The students have to believe it, too. Students also have
to come to believe that mathematics is enjoyable and that they are
mathematically capable.
The Common Core and Everyday Mathematics are designed to develop
productive dispositions—habits of mind that will ensure that the mathematics
students learn will be used. Both aim at producing students who not only
know mathematics, but also like mathematics and are disposed to use it to
solve problems.
The Common Core’s practice standards describe proficiencies that include the
“habitual inclination to see mathematics as sensible, useful, and worthwhile,
coupled with a belief in diligence and one’s own efficacy” (NGA & CCSSO, 2010,
p. 6). The following sections examine these Standards for Mathematical Practice.

1.2 Standards for Mathematical Practice SMP7

The Common Core’s Standards for Mathematical Practice (SMP) propose
norms for the school mathematics classroom and describe what the
classroom culture should be. The eight SMPs are identical across grades K–12,
reflecting the expectation that students will develop proficiency with the
Section 1

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practices over the course of their school careers. The Common Core State
Standards for Mathematics (NGA & CCSSO, 2010) provides an overview.
The Standards for Mathematical Practice describe varieties of expertise
that mathematics educators at all levels should seek to develop in their
students. These practices rest on important “processes and proficiencies”
with longstanding importance in mathematics education. The first of these
are the NCTM process standards of problem solving, reasoning and proof,
communication, representation, and connections. The second are the
strands of mathematical proficiency specified in the National Research
Council’s report Adding It Up: adaptive reasoning, strategic competence,
conceptual understanding (comprehension of mathematical concepts,
operations and relations), procedural fluency (skill in carrying out
procedures flexibly, accurately, efficiently and appropriately), and
productive disposition (habitual inclination to see mathematics as sensible,
useful, and worthwhile, coupled with a belief in diligence and one’s own
efficacy). (p. 6)
The SMPs are a great fit with Everyday Mathematics. The SMPs and Everyday
Mathematics both emphasize reasoning, problem solving, use of multiple
representations, mathematical modeling, tool use, communication, and other
ways of making sense of mathematics. To help teachers build the SMPs into
their everyday instruction and recognize the practices when they emerge in

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 Everyday Mathematics lessons, the authors have developed Goals for
Mathematical Practice (GMP). These goals unpack each SMP, operationalizing
each standard in ways that are appropriate for elementary students.
Note The Appendix in the
Each practice is addressed below. The “headline” for each Common Core SMP Teacher’s Lesson Guide provides the
is followed by a list of Everyday Mathematics GMPs and a discussion. This full text of each of the Common
section concludes with a vision for classrooms that support and enhance Core’s Standards for Mathematical
students’ development of their own mathematical practices. Practice and the corresponding
Everyday Mathematics Goals for
Mathematical Practice. In the
Teacher Center, they are
1.2.1 SMP1 Make sense of problems and also accessible from the Main
persevere in solving them. Menu by clicking on the Grade-
GMP1.1 Make sense of your problem. Level Resources link. See also the
Teacher’s Lesson Guide ebook.
GMP1.2 Reflect on your thinking as you solve your problem.
GMP1.3 Keep trying when your problem is hard.
GMP1.4 Check whether your answer makes sense.
GMP1.5 Solve problems in more than one way.
GMP1.6 Compare the strategies you and others use.
SMP1 is about problem solving, which has been a focus of recommendations
about school mathematics since 1977 when the National Council of Supervisors
of Mathematics listed problem solving as the first of its “basic skills.” Problem
solving has also been the foundation of standards documents from the
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (1989, 1991, 1995, 2000). The
emphasis on learning through problem solving in Everyday Mathematics is
equally longstanding and is fully consistent with SMP1. In the discussions of the
other SMPs, you will find that problem solving permeates all the SMPs.
Much of SMP1 is inspired by George Polya’s well-known approach to problem

Section 1
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solving described in his classic book, How To Solve It. Polya outlined four
phases in solving a problem: (i) Understanding the problem (ii) Devising a plan
(iii) Carrying out the plan (iv) Looking back (1973, pp. xvi–xvii). The GMPs as a
whole, and especially GMPs 1.1, 1.4, and 1.6, express Polya’s vision of
mathematical problem solving and emphasize the importance of students’
persistent engagement and ongoing reflection throughout the problem-
solving process.
Everyday Mathematics views learning mathematics as a problem-solving
activity, so that problem solving cuts across all the content and practice
standards. Understanding ideas deeply means connecting them in more and
more extensive networks, such as when children connect ideas about sharing
to the meaning of division or connect fractions as parts of a whole to fractions
as locations or intervals on a number line. Similarly, students are solving
problems as they work to explain why their procedures make sense and yield
correct results. Students are learning mathematics when they solve problems
in more than one way (GMP1.5) and share solution strategies with each other
(GMP1.6). As students find success in learning through problem solving, they
increasingly reflect on their thinking during the problem-solving process
(GMP1.2) and keep trying when the problem is hard (GMP1.3). When problem
solving and learning mathematics are merged in a classroom, a student who
struggles to make sense of a multistep number story with multidigit numbers

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 may use smaller and easier numbers to represent the problem situation, and
then use concrete objects or other representations to show the action
(GMPs 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.5). Another student who is grappling with the meaning of a
problem may ask questions of peers to help him or her make sense of the
situation (GMPs 1.1, 1.3). Such students are demonstrating that they are growing
in their proficiency with the SMPs.

1.2.2 SMP2 Reason abstractly and quantitatively.

GMP2.1 Create mathematical representations using numbers, words,
pictures, symbols, gestures, tables, graphs, and concrete objects.
GMP2.2 Make sense of the representations you and others use.
GMP2.3 Make connections between representations.
SMP2 is about abstracting, making sense of abstractions, and making
connections between abstractions and what they represent. The ability to
abstract begins to develop very early. Children see two cats, two cherries, two
flowers, and over time understand the meaning of two. Later, children
understand what three is, and so forth. Eventually children come to
understand numbers as abstractions that can fit many contexts and even
come to understand numbers without reference to any context. When
children create mathematical representations by using the numeral 2 or
drawing 2 tally marks, they are abstracting from a situation or problem to an
abstract representation (GMP2.1). When children connect the numbers or
tallies back to the context, for example, “there are two cats in our house,” then
they are connecting the abstraction back to its original context. They are
making sense of the representation (GMP2.2).
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2 2 2

Making connections between representations means students are able to

move back and forth between different representations of a mathematical
situation (GMP2.3). For example, when students first use representations such
as base-10 blocks and number grids to subtract multidigit numbers and then
connect these representations to symbolic representations of the operation,
they are abstracting from the blocks and grids to the symbols. When students
make connections between the representations such as explaining how they
make trades in a subtraction algorithm by referring to tens and ones as longs
and cubes, they show their understanding of place value and the procedure.

SMP2 and Problem Solving

These kinds of connections are critical for problem solving. When students
make sense of a problem and are able to represent the mathematics of the
situation, they are in a better position to figure out which operations or
relationships to use in a solution. When students solve problems in more than

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 one way and compare their strategies to those of other students, the different
approaches are often embedded in different representations, so they often
need to make sense of various representations.

1.2.3 SMP3 Construct viable arguments and

critique the reasoning of others.
GMP3.1 Make mathematical conjectures and arguments.
GMP3.2 Make sense of others’ mathematical thinking.
SMP3 is about making claims, or conjectures, about mathematical relationships
and regularities and then justifying those claims with arguments based on
explicitly stated assumptions, definitions, and previously established results
(GMP 3.1).
Mathematical arguments are not the arguments that children often think
about—quarrels. Rather, a mathematical argument is logical reasoning used to
show why a conjecture or claim is true or false. For example, when making an
argument to show that a conjecture is true, a student may use logic to show
that the claim works for every possible case in the given domain, such as the
whole numbers or the rational numbers. On the other hand, a student can
make an argument to show a conjecture is false by showing just one situation
in the given domain for which the claim does not hold—this is called a
counterexample.
A student might conjecture that in whole numbers, multiples of 10 always have
0 in the ones place. The student’s argument could be based on grouping, place
value, and the multiplication algorithm. The student could say that a multiple of
10 is any number times 10. Then he or she might say that 10 is 1 ten and 0 ones.
Finally, the student could refer to the multiplication algorithm, in which one
step is finding the product for the ones place—and the ones place in such a

Section 1
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product will always result in a zero, no matter what the non-ten factor is,
because any number times 0 has a product of 0. On the other hand, if the
conjecture is made that all multiples of 5 have a 5 in the ones place, a student
need only point to one counterexample, such as 5 × 4 = 20, to show the claim
is not true.
Making sense of others’ mathematical thinking is essential to the principal
work of mathematicians, which is proving and refuting claims and
conjectures. Mathematicians submit their conjectures and arguments (or
“proofs”) to the scrutiny of a community of other mathematicians, just as
students do when they pose a conjecture and argument to their peers. When
their conjectures and arguments are well articulated, other students can
make sense of their mathematical thinking and decide whether the reasoning
is correct. When a student’s conjecture and its supporting argument are not
well articulated, peers ask questions to better understand what is meant,
which in turn helps the student construct a clearer conjecture and argument
(GMP3.2).

SMP3 and Problem Solving

Constructing viable arguments and critiquing the reasoning of others is
essential to mathematical problem solving. When students propose solutions
to problems and defend their reasoning, they are beginning to engage in the

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 process of conjecture and argument. In order to make sense of others’
mathematical thinking, students must first make sense of the problem and
then evaluate the reasoning in the solution and explanation.

1.2.4 SMP4 Model with mathematics.

GMP4.1 Model real-world situations using graphs, drawings, tables,
symbols, numbers, diagrams, and other representations.
GMP4.2 Use mathematical models to solve problems and
answer questions.
SMP4 is about mathematizing real-world problems and using the resulting
representations to find meaningful solutions. In order to create a mathematical
model, students must interpret a real-world situation to identify critical
mathematical features that must be included in a mathematical
representation, or model, of that situation. The representations could be
graphs, drawings, tables, symbols, numbers, or diagrams. (GMP4.1) Students
use the model they create to solve the problem, and then they check whether
their results are reasonable by mapping the answer back to the real-world
situation. If the result is not meaningful, then the student revises the model or
generates a new one. The cyclic process continues until a reasonable result is
obtained (GMP4.2).
For example, consider this problem: A total of 27 children are riding on a school
bus. 12 of the children are girls. How many children are boys? A student might
represent the situation with a parts-and-total diagram, stripping the situation
of the context, while capturing the relationships between the quantities in the
problem (GMP4.1).

Total
27
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Part Part
12 ?
Parts-and-total diagram

This diagram is a useful model because it clearly reveals the need to find a
missing part. No matter what strategy is used to solve the problem (for
example, counting up from 12 to 27, or subtracting 12 from 27), an important
aspect of the modeling process is to evaluate both the model and answer in
the context of the real-world situation. This will show whether the fit between
model and situation is reasonable and meaningful (GMP4.2). For example, by
asking, “What does 12 mean in this diagram?” the student should be able to
connect it back to the context, and know that 12 means 12 girls.
Modeling with mathematics is closely related to SMP2, reasoning abstractly
and quantitatively. SMP2 emphasizes abstraction, including building
mathematical representations of various sorts, making sense of those
representations, and making connections among representations. SMP4, on
the other hand, emphasizes using abstract representations in mathematical
modeling and making connections between real-world situations and
mathematical representations that model those situations. The mathematical

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 modeling required by SMP4 involves cycles of representing a real-world
situation with an abstract model, manipulating the model to produce results,
testing the results from the model by mapping them back to the real-world
problem, and assessing how well the model worked.

SMP4 and Problem Solving

Modeling with mathematics is problem solving. Students make sense of their
problem by mathematizing it, producing an abstract representation that
captures the mathematics in the problem situation and omits irrelevant
contextual information. When a result is produced from the model, students
check to see if that result makes sense in the context of the problem. They may
find their model does not produce fully satisfactory results, in which case they
need to keep trying, reflecting further on the mathematics of the problem and
revising their model to better capture the quantitative relationships in the
problem. When students complete multiple cycles of building, testing, and
revising a model, they are solving problems in more than one way (usually in
improved ways), and comparing the early strategies to those used in
subsequent cycles.

1.2.5 SMP5 Use appropriate tools strategically.

GMP5.1 Choose appropriate tools.
GMP5.2 Use tools effectively and make sense of your results.
SMP5 is about students selecting appropriate tools and using them effectively
and strategically. Some tools are common across grades (for example, paper
and pencil, rulers, calculators, tables, graphs, number lines) and other tools
vary by grade level (base-10 blocks, number grids, fraction circle pieces,
protractors, eTools). While students may use different tools, one goal of
SMP5 is for students to select an appropriate tool for the mathematical work

Section 1
Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

at hand (GMP5.1).
Selecting an appropriate tool is only a first step. One must also use the tool
effectively, know its limitations, and identify reasonable and unreasonable
results. For example, a student using a calculator effectively to solve a problem
will verify that the result is reasonable in case any of the values and/or
operations were not keyed in correctly. A student will know the limitations
of the tool, for example, recognizing when the remainder to a division problem
should be interpreted as a whole number rather than as the decimal value
displayed on the calculator. Using tools effectively also includes making
strategic decisions. Consider this problem: Granola bars can be bought in
a 3-box pack. Each box weighs 8.9 ounces. What does the 3-box pack weigh?
In this example, whether a student selects a calculator or paper and pencil
to solve this problem, multiplying 3 × 8.9 is more strategic than adding
8.9 + 8.9 + 8.9.

SMP5 and Problem Solving

Appropriate and effective tool use is critical to problem solving. Students must
make sense of a problem before selecting a tool for solving it. They must
reflect on their thinking during the solution process in order to decide how to
use that tool strategically to solve the problem. Finally, students need to check
to see that the answer produced by the tool makes sense.

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 1.2.6 SMP6 Attend to precision.
GMP6.1 Explain your mathematical thinking clearly and precisely.
GMP6.2 Use an appropriate level of precision for your problem.
GMP6.3 Use clear labels, units, and mathematical language.
GMP6.4 Think about accuracy and efficiency when you count, measure,
and calculate.
SMP6 calls for students to keep precision in mind throughout their
mathematical work. An important aspect of this SMP is communicating
mathematical thinking to others using clear definitions, statements, and
representations (GMP6.1). When students try to explain their mathematical
thinking to others, they naturally see the need for clearer and more precise
mathematical language. The claim that “Mathematics is the universal
language” refers in part to the mathematical conventions that exist throughout
the world for using labels, units, and mathematical language (GMP6.3). These
conventions make discussions among mathematicians and users of
mathematics possible across language barriers. For example, everyone knows
by convention that a square meter means a region bounded by a length of one
meter on each side of a square. Although students in Everyday Mathematics
initially learn concepts and procedures by experiencing them and describing
them in their own words, over the years they learn formal terminology and
conventional ways of describing quantitative and geometric situations.
A second aspect of SMP6 is using units appropriate for the quantities, sizes,
and purposes of the situation (GMP6.2). For example, appropriate units for
finding the area of a classroom would be square feet, square meters, or square
yards. Each of these conveys a meaningful image of the size of the room to a
person who did not make the measurements. Using square miles or kilometers
would be inappropriate because the room would measure only a tiny fraction
Section 1

Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

of these units, which would not be helpful in communicating a sense of the size
of the room to someone else. Similarly, using square centimeters or square
inches would result in such large quantities of each unit that the resulting
measure would not be helpful either. The selection of a tool or unit of measure
that will minimize error is based on an appropriate level of precision, which
depends on the relationships between the quantities in the problem, the units
used, and the situation.
A third aspect of SMP6 is calculating and measuring accurately and efficiently.
Attending to accuracy is making sure the count, calculation, or measure is
close to the true value. Since all measurements are approximations, it is
necessary to report them within reasonable measurement error (GMP6.4).
For example, if students measuring the length of a line segment to the
nearest half-inch are doing so accurately, they will report a length of 8 _2 inches
1

if the measure falls between 8 _4 inches and 8 _4 inches. Working efficiently is

1 3

important both in itself and also because it can drive advances in

understandings and skills.

SMP6 and Problem Solving

Attending to precision is part of the problem-solving process and an essential
component of communicating mathematical thinking and solution strategies
to others. Making sense of a problem means you understand the quantities

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 and the relationship among those quantities, so the chosen strategy will result
in answers that are appropriately precise. Checking to make sure your answer
makes sense is part of ensuring accuracy.

1.2.7 SMP7 Look for and make use of structure.

GMP7.1 Look for mathematical structures such as categories, patterns,
and properties.
GMP7.2 Use structures to solve problems and answer questions.
SMP7 is about closely examining a situation to identify a generality in terms of
a category, pattern, or property. Searching for and identifying patterns has
been part of Everyday Mathematics since it was first written. Extending a
pattern to a structure means that the description of the pattern is formalized
by identifying mathematical categories and properties. For example, first
graders solving a series of addition problems (32 + 10, 32 + 40, 32 + 60) using
base-10 blocks will likely represent the 32 as 3 tens and 2 ones, but initially may
add 10 ones. The move to adding 40 and 60 encourages children to notice that
they could simply add 4 tens (longs) and 6 tens (longs). When students explain
why they can use the 4 longs and 6 longs instead of 40 ones and 60 ones, they
are noticing a structural property of our base-10 place-value system—that
10 ones is equivalent to the composite unit 1 ten (GMP7.1).
Even more powerful is students’ use of mathematical structure to answer
questions and solve problems. For example, when learning mental math for
multiplication, third graders may use place-value structures when they think
of 2 × 34 as “2 thirties + 2 fours,” resulting in a product of 60 + 8 or 68. Later
they learn about the Distributive Property of Multiplication over Addition. They
can then reflect back on the pattern they used in mental math. The ultimate
goal is for the student to recognize the connection between the mental math

Section 1
strategy and the formal structure, or property, of arithmetic that underlies
Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

that strategy: 2 × (30 + 4) = (2 × 30) + (2 × 4).

SMP7 and Problem Solving

Finding and using structure is embedded in the problem-solving process.
When students reflect on their thinking as they solve a problem, their abilities
to apply their knowledge of mathematical structure are enhanced. Further, as
students improve their understanding and proficiency in the use of structure,
they have the tools to keep trying when solving hard problems.

1.2.8 SMP8 Look for and express regularity in

repeated reasoning.
GMP8.1 Create and justify rules, shortcuts, and generalizations.
SMP8 is about using mathematical structures and patterns to create shortcuts
or rules that can make procedures and operations more efficient. While SMP7
involves looking for and applying structures and patterns, SMP8 goes further.
SMP8 asks students to generalize in order to make solving problems more
efficient. Students creating such generalizations and shortcuts need to be able
to explain why and how they work so that someone else can use them
confidently and with understanding (GMP8.1).

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 To illustrate, a student may repeatedly use a standard algorithm for
subtracting a fraction from a whole number, such as the one below.

3 _33
4
- _13

3 _32
A student who is actively searching for justifiable shortcuts may notice a
generalization after solving a few of these types of problems: 2 - _ = 1_
1 9
10 10
;
1 - _8 = _8 ; and 6 - _6 = 5_6 . A student may notice that when subtracting a unit
1 7 1 5

fraction from a whole number, the difference is a mixed number made up of

the whole number decreased by 1 and a fraction that is one “piece” away from
a whole (so the denominator is the same and the numerator is one less than
the denominator). A student may justify this shortcut by saying that when you
take away a unit fraction from a whole number, you always break up one of the
wholes into fractional parts to be able to subtract a unit fraction, so the
number of wholes decreases by 1. To subtract just one of the fraction pieces
from the whole broken up into parts of the same size, the difference is 1 “piece”
less than what is needed to make a whole.

SMP8 and Problem Solving

The proposal and justification of a shortcut, rule, or generalization is similar to
conjecture and argument as described in SMP3. The difference is that SMP8
emphasizes the active search for regularity to find efficiencies during problem
solving. SMP8, then, is also highly connected to SMP1 because students are
continually reflecting on their thinking while solving the problem. Students
must also check to see whether a shortcut makes sense by assessing
Section 1

Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

intermediate results during the solution process. Even when a generalization
or rule is identified, students continue to search for more efficient ways to
solve any repeated calculations.

1.2.9 Standards for Mathematical Practice in

the Everyday Mathematics Classroom
Teaching Strategies
Everyday Mathematics provides specific guidance for teaching mathematical
practices targeted in each lesson. The following general strategies are also
useful for facilitating students’ development of the SMPs:
• Provide opportunities and time for students to grapple with complex
problems and analyze other students’ strategies and results.
• Maintain high levels of cognitive demand. Do not provide so much
scaffolding that students are not challenged to solve problems on their own.
• Encourage students to revise their strategies and results after reflecting on
various ways of thinking learned from other students.
• Remind students that struggling to solve complex problems is a natural
part of doing mathematics. It can be fun to keep trying when a problem is
hard and satisfying when a strategy or solution is improved.

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 Many students and their teachers feel uncomfortable when students must
work hard to mathematically figure out a problem. Alan Schoenfeld’s work
with college students revealed that even at that level, students felt
uncomfortable struggling to solve problems. He found a way to provide help
when frustration emerged. To help them reflect on their thinking as they
worked on their problems, he asked the following questions: What are you
doing? Why are you doing it? Is it helping?
Schoenfeld found that over multiple problem-solving experiences, students began
to ask these questions of themselves, and they began to learn how to persevere in
solving problems. In field tests of the Open Response and Reengagement lessons
for this edition, these questions were helpful as they prompted conversation and
rethinking among student groups. Sometimes, if frustration continued, groups
were asked to split up and observe other groups working on the problem for a
few minutes. Then they came back together to discuss what they observed to see
whether it would help them solve the problem.
Everyday Mathematics has long used a diagram similar to the one below to
convey the dynamic nature of the problem-solving process to students. The
diagram captures the spirit of the mathematical practices when thinking about
all of the connections and actions across cells and within each cell.

Organize the information.

• Study the information in the problem.
• Arrange the information into a list, table,
graph, or diagram.
• Look for more information if you need it.
• Get rid of information you don't need.

Understand the problem. Play with the information.

• Retell the problem in your • Draw a picture, diagram, or
own words. another mathematical
• Figure out what you want to find. representation.

Section 1
Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

• Figure out what you know. • Write a number model.

• Imagine what the answer • Model the problem using objects
will look like. such as counters or base-10
• Make a guess at the answer. blocks.

Check your answer as you work. Figure out what math can help.
• Does your answer make sense? • Can you use addition?
• Compare your answer with Subtraction? Another operation?
a classmate's. • Can you use geometry? Patterns?
• Does your answer fit the Other mathematics?
problem? • Try the math. See what happens.
• Can you solve the problem • What units are you using? Label
another way? your numbers with units.

Problem-solving process

The mathematical practices cannot be taught as directly as content is taught. For more information about
Rather, through their problem-solving experiences and reflections on those assessing the mathematical
experiences, students develop proficiency in the mathematical practices and practices, see Section 9
begin to notice and name those practices. After solving a problem, students Assessment in Everyday
Mathematics.
can examine their solutions to see how they fit with the targeted GMPs.
Student learning of SMPs is a developmental process, so that students’ initial
ideas are likely to be somewhat crude. Everyday Mathematics assumes that
while the name of the practice remains the same, students’ understanding
and ability to articulate the practices will grow over time. The process is

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 similar to an apprenticeship, in which the apprentice gradually acquires the
practices of a trade by engaging in the work of that trade under the watchful
eye of a mentor.

SMPs in Everyday Mathematics Lessons

The SMPs are addressed in units and lessons the following ways:
• Highlighted
g g GMPs Each regular lesson targets one to three GMPs.
GMP icons highlight activities and questions that engage students in
the targeted practice. Calling out GMPs at point of use gives teachers
confidence that they are addressing the practices.

For more information,

• Open and Response and Reengagement Lessons A special two-day lesson
see Section 6 Open Response is included in each unit and Kindergarten section to provide opportunities
and Reengagement. for students to engage in targeted mathematical practices as they solve a
problem.
• Writing/Reasoning Prompts Many Math Boxes have writing/reasoning
For more information on
writing/reasoning prompts, see prompts that encourage students to communicate their understanding of
Section 9.3.1 Assessment concepts and skills and their strategies for solving problems. Writing/
Opportunities within Lessons. reasoning prompts provide valuable opportunities for engaging in the
mathematical practices.
• Pages in the Reference Books The first section in each Reference Book
describes the use of each of the practices for students. The pages show
children at each grade level solving problems using the SMPs so students
can see what is expected when they solve problems and explain their
thinking.
• Standards for Mathematical Practice Posters These classroom posters
list the SMPs and GMPs, providing a daily reminder of these expectations.

References
Section 1

Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

Bloom, B. S., Engelhart, M. D., Furst, E. J., Hill, W. H., & Krathwohl, D. R. (1956).
Taxonomy of educational objectives: The classification of educational goals.
Handbook I: Cognitive domain. New York: David McKay.
Hess, K. K., Carlock, D., Jones, B., & Walkup, J. R. (2009). What exactly do “fewer,
clearer, and higher standards” really look like in the classroom? Using a
cognitive rigor matrix to analyze curriculum, plan lessons, and implement
assessments. Retrieved from http://www.nciea.org/publications/
cognitiverigorpaper_KH12.pdf
National Council of Supervisors of Mathematics. (1977). Position paper on basic
skills. Reprinted in Arithmetic Teacher, 25(1), 19–22.
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (1989). Curriculum and
evaluation standards for school mathematics. Reston, VA: Author.
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (1991). Professional standards for
teaching mathematics. Reston, VA: Author.
National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (1995). Assessment standards for
school mathematics. Reston, VA: Author.

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 National Council of Teachers of Mathematics. (2000). Principles and standards
for school mathematics. Reston, VA: Author.
National Governors Association Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief
State School Officers. (2010). Common core state standards for mathematics.
Washington, DC: Authors.
National Governors Association Center for Best Practices & Council of Chief
State School Officers. (2013, April 9). K–8 publishers’ criteria for the common
core state standards for mathematics. Washington, DC: Authors.
Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers. (2013).
Principles regarding the common core state standards for mathematics.
Retrieved from http:// http://parcconline.org/mcf/mathematics/principles-
regarding-common-core-state-standards-mathematics
Polya, G. (1973). How to solve it: A new aspect of mathematical method (2nd ed.).
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Schoenfeld, A. H. (1992). Learning to think mathematically: Problem solving,
metacognition, and sense-making in mathematics. In D. Grouws (Ed.), Handbook
of research on mathematics teaching and learning (pp. 334–370). New York:
MacMillan.
Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium. (2012a, April 16). General item
specifications. Retrieved from http://www.smarterbalanced.org/wordpress/
wp-content/uploads/2012/05/TaskItemSpecifications/ItemSpecifications/
GeneralItemSpecifications.pdf
Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium. (2012b, September 7). Building a
system to support improved teaching and learning [Webinar]. In CCSS for
Mathematics Webinar Series. Retrieved from http://www.smarterbalanced.org/
wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/CCSS-for-Mathematic-Presentation-

Section 1
Part-1.pdf
Copyright © McGraw-Hill Education. Permission is granted to reproduce for classroom use.

Webb, N. L. (1999). Alignment of science and mathematics standards and

assessments in four states (Council of Chief State School Officers and National
Institute for Science Education Research Monograph No. 18). Madison, WI:
University of Wisconsin–Madison, Wisconsin Center for Education Research.
Webb, N. L. (2002, March 28). Depth-of-knowledge levels for four content areas.
Retrieved from http://facstaff.wcer.wisc.edu/normw/All%20content%
20areas%20%20DOK%20levels%2032802.pdf

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