STRATEGIES IN UNDERSTANDING WORK PROBLEMS 1

Strategies in Understanding Word Problems

Aracely Polanco

EDUC 403
STRATEGIES IN UNDERSTANDING WORK PROBLEMS 2

Abstract

During my fieldwork hours in Peekskill High School I was placed in an Algebra I class

with English Language Learners. Just as previously encountered in the city, it showed that

English Language Learners struggle with Mathematics not only because of a lack of conceptual

understanding, but also lack of literacy fluency due to not being proficient in English. In my

study, I demonstrated the “Sketch-to-Stretch” method to the students to see if this would help

them with word problems.

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When it came to your mathematics course, word problems were everyone’s worst

nightmare. “Why were their words in math? Math should just be numbers: no words, no

variables, just plain computations.” This was a general opinion of students in Peekskill. In word

problems students should be able to understand what the problem is asking and respond with an

explanation on, not what the answer is, but how they got the answer. The Common Core

Standards has an “emphasis on communication was that curricula were developed to support an

inquiry-based approach to mathematics instruction, which required that students engage with and

produce a variety of oral and written mathematical texts.” (Doerr, Temple, 5, 2016). Students

struggle with being able to communicate when it comes to mathematics, especially those

students who are already struggling to communicate in the English language.

L: Look at the Problem

The students in Peekskill High School were not only struggling with grasping the concept

of the mathematics, but also the ability to understand what is being asked due to not being able to

read in English. The classes that I observed were English Language Learners (ELL) and had

recently moved into the country within the last one-three years. The students came from working

families and in their home country they were more accustomed to not putting school as a

priority. If a worksheet was in Spanish, it showed that students were able to do the assignments.

The lack of motivation and inability understand the math problems in the English language

meant that the students did not have the will to learn.

E: Examine what you know

When students will be taking Common Core tests they will be in English. The Common

Core main focus not for students to memorize, regurgitate equations and substitute numbers to

retrieve an answer. The Common Core requires “an interdisciplinary approach to literacy
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because of ‘the need for college and career ready students to be proficient in reading complex

informational text independently in a variety of content areas.’” (del Prado Hill, Friedland,

McMillen,2016). The need for literacy skills in mathematics is important in order to do well on

standardized testing, but also be able to use what they know in other courses.

Since math exams are more centered on having word problems in order to enhance

literacy skills, it is up the teacher to be able to show students how they can do so. In a way, math

teachers must be able to not only teach their students computational skills, but also find a way to

implement literacy skills especially if they have ELL students. Then, students will not only

understand what is being asked they can see how this can be used in the real world. If students,

see examples on how mathematics can be beneficial outside the school setting they will be

motivated.

The students at Peekskill High School in the ELL Algebra class were able to understand

how to find the slope of a line, however when they were asked similar questions but formatted

into word problems they seemed to struggle and not be able to answer the problem. “Maria is

baking cookies in order to fundraise money for her family. The cost of the ingredients is $80,

plus $2.50 per container to hold the cookies. Write an equation in slope-intercept form that

models the total cost of printing the calendars.” Students get confused as they lose focus around

the words and don’t know what they should place for the variables for the slope, the intercept

and the answer. For this reason, I wanted to research what literacy skills would help ELL

students, but also wanted to see if I would be able to show them that the learning skills they are

getting- computational and literacy- would be beneficial not only in math courses, but in their

other courses and outside of school as well.

A: Acquire Knowledge
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A study by Doerr and Temple included two six grade teachers finding ways to implement

more reading skills in their way of teaching math. Between both set of six grade students, one

teacher focused more on implementing reading skills in her way of teaching while the other

teacher did not. While the first group of students would be taught by the teacher using examples

from the textbooks and focusing on computational skills. This was more of a teacher centered

style of learning. While the second group of students would focus on reading skills. The teacher

would not only use textbook examples, but also create her own examples. The students would

interact with the example and break it down in order to understand it. In the study, the teacher

showed they would use “macro-genres” in their lesson plans which were analyzed to determine

their “elemental genre” (Martin, 1992). Doerr and Temple state that “an elemental genre such as

a description may be found in a macro-genre such as a word problem.” The study showed that

providing word problems that had real-life context would provide connections for the students or

activate prior knowledge.

The results of the study were shown over a four-year span. At the beginning of the study,

both teachers, Sara and Tracy, focused on teaching the computational skills. Prior to the

investigation, they did not deem necessary to provide their students reading skills as it was more

important to teach the basics of mathematics. Tracy was questioning what was so difficult of the

word problems, “Is it that they [the students] don’t have the skills behind it or is it that they just

don’t understand the language.” (Doerr, Temple, 17, 2016) As the years went by, the teachers

saw that by implementing reading strategies lead to a better understanding of the mathematical

concepts and students can communicate their findings. The teachers went from believing there

was no place for reading skills in math their first year on the project to being “100% committed

to it because [of] the benefit that it gives to the kids in terms of mastery” (Doerr, Temple, 18,
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2016). Students do not realize that being able to analyze text does not always come from long

readings, but they can be a given problem and having to analyze the graphs and tables that come

along with it. Sara was able to create her own strategy to help the students be able to analyze.

This method was known as the 3PAS: Purpose, Picture-It, Pause-and-Check, Answer and Sense

(Doerr, Temple, 24, 2016). After four years, Tracy believes that reading strategies will benefit

her students, but she was not able to create a lesson plan that could coincide with her teaching

strategy. Tracy could see that Sara’s method of the 3PAS allowed students to be able to engage

and be effective for reading mathematics texts.

Del Prado Hill, Friedland, and McMillen did a study on how mathematics teachers can

use a literacy checklist in their teaching style that is designed to be beneficial for the students.

The goal of the study is to see is to be able to aid students with the mathematics-literacy

integration part of the Common Core. Since the Common Core has been emphasizing the

importance of integration of literacy skills and mathematics to be able to apply in real life

situations, math teachers must take part in not only teaching computational skills, but also

conceptual skills. In this study, teachers were given two checklists. The goal first checklist shows

the different literacy skills that can be implemented in their lesson (Figure 1) and the second is

for the teacher to process how they were able to implement the literacy skill within the lesson

(Figure 2).

Figure 1: Mathematics Literacy Planning Framework (Del Prado Hill, Friedland, McMillen,

2016)

Figure 2: Mathematics-Literacy Implementation Checklist (Del Prado Hill, Friedland, McMillen,

2016)
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The results of the study showed that teachers believed that the use of the checklists aided

them in creating lesson plans that would implement different literacy skills. Teachers commented

that they saw the checklist as an opportunity for teamwork between the teachers to create lesson

plans that would coincide with the ways that all teachers taught. It also reminds teachers that

they must use formative and summative assessments. This study was more helpful for teachers

that struggle in creating lesson plans that will implement the literacy skills. The first checklist

provides multiple strategies that a teacher could use in their lesson plans. The biggest concern

that the teachers from this study had was teaching vocabulary. Teachers must teacher their

students’ terms that they have never heard of before and it is harder when the students are ELL.

Fortunately, the planning checklist provides multiple ways on how to teach vocabulary. Teachers

realize that the challenge lies with word problems where students must use different skills in

order to decipher what is being asked and how to approach the problem. Teachers of the survey

stated that the checklist gave them an idea on how they can teach their students to develop the

ideas.

The final article reiterates the idea of how teaching mathematics is difficult especially

when the students have a limited proficiency of the English language. In the last article,

Robinson looks at three different categories: literacy development strategies, cultural harmony

strategies and effective instructional strategies. We observe the different strategies for each

category that could benefit students that are ELL. This study takes place in Florida, which like

New York, deal with a large amount of ELL students in a classroom. Based off these

suggestions, I believe that many of these strategies can be used by a teacher to help them teach

word problems to any student.

D: Devise a Plan
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From my observations of the ELL Algebra class in Peekskill, I developed a plan that I

believe would help students improve with word problems that they would need to familiarize

themselves with. For ELL students, I believe the best format is for students to provide visuals for

themselves such as doing a “Sketch-to-Stretch.” Also, for students who are learning the English

language, the teacher would provide worksheets that are in their native language so that they can

comprehend what they are reading. The worksheets would be double sided, with problems very

similar, I would either bold or highlight key terms so that the students can relate an important

term from their native language to the English language.

During my visit, the students were in the unit of finding the perimeter and area and use

the information to answer questions based off the answer. Generally, when students encounter a

perimeter word problem they prefer not to answer and move on to a multiple-choice question.

This gave an opportunity to introduce students to the “Sketch-to-Stretch” method. In my

strategy, I would first ask students to circle or underline the key terms of the question. A specific

question may ask “For every square foot, how much would one expect to spend on flooring?”

Students’ main goal is to find the sides of the length and width of the rectangle and ignore the

“extra” information that the word problem gives. They are to look at the dimensions of the figure

to then be able to answer the question. Math is difficult enough to understand the wording of

questions including the numbers, by adding visuals it would allow students to be able to picture

the question to a guide to answer.

E: Execute the Plan

During the lesson I participated, the students were looking at the area of figures to

determine to then find the price to fill the figure. The example the students were looking at was,

“Maria would like to paint her floor two different colors, brown and white. The brown would be
STRATEGIES IN UNDERSTANDING WORK PROBLEMS 9

the framing around the white rectangular center. Per square inch, it would cost 25 cents to paint

brown and 75 cents to paint white. How much would she spend to paint her entire flooring?”

This problem seems to be a bit wordy for students, and for that they would not attempt to do it.

However, I worked with two girls, Stephanie and Jennifer and introduced them to “Sketch-to-

Stretch.”

After reading the problem, they noticed the first sentence was important in the fact that

there would be two variables throughout the problem, the brown and white paint. This example

provided a visual already which was an aid to the students. They highlighted key information

they deemed essential in solving the problem. Then, I asked them how they would approach the

problem. By using the “Sketch-to-Stretch” worksheet, they began to break the problem apart. I

asked them to write down step by step on how they would attack the problem. The girls noticed

that “per square inch” meant that this problem was an area problem and they had to multiply.

The girls were able to find the area, but then were stuck on what to do next. We used the white

board to draw out the visual given. Together, they were able to identify that the white paint area

would be within the brown, meaning that there had to be a subtraction of white paint area from

the brown paint area. On their paper, they drew the rectangles to first identify the area of each

before making calculations. Then, they wrote down their step-by-step explanation to find the

total price.

For those students who were struggling to understand the problem due to the language

barrier, there were sheets that were double sided and was in Spanish on one side. These students

had to finish both problems and use Sketch-to-Stretch to explain in their own language. These

students were reminded of terms such as “multiply,” “area,” “subtract,” and “add.” They are to

determine from each section of the problem when to use the operations. I asked students if the
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strategy was helpful. Both students that I worked with agreed that it was helpful. It would also be

beneficial for the students to get math problems that relate to activities that they understand.

Most students come from working families. I asked students if they worked themselves and some

are part time masonry workers. By creating problems that seem realistic they believe the math

can be used for real life situations.

However, given a test with only a certain amount of time it would be difficult to write out

each step and be able to find the answer. This method is best for examples of homework or a one

question quiz, but with a test with more multiple questions it would be time consuming. The

double-sided questions were helpful to students because with seeing a question multiple times

they can identify key terms in their language and match them to key terms in English. This

helped students such as Stephanie and Jennifer recognize “per square inch” and they knew they

would have to find area. I believe that with practicing the “Sketch-to-Stretch” the students would

learn how to create visualizations for themselves in order to answer a problem, but with time

they will not find the need to write the steps as they will be thinking them. This strategy would

be beneficial for students for any algebra question.

Figure 3: Example of Jennifer’s Sketch-to Stretch

R: Repeat Steps as necessary

Fortunately, I have the opportunity of still meeting with the class of ELL algebra. I would

like to continue to see if these two strategies of “Sketch-to-Stretch” will help with other types of

problems in Algebra. Also, to see if by creating worksheets with similar questions in English and

Spanish it makes it easier for students to identify terms of a problem. I believe the results showed

that students did better, and both strategies should continue to be used in the classroom.