Chapter 9: Using Classroom Assessment to Support Growth of Number Sense in First Grade

As a first grade teacher of mathematics, I worked to focus my teaching to meet the wide variety of students’ mathematical abilities in my classroom. It was my goal to move all students to achieve my school district’s mathematics standards for first grade. Using the Investigations in Number, Data, and Space^® (Investigations) curriculum materials, I taught mathematical concepts through modeling, student led discussions, games, manipulatives, story problems, and child-centered investigations. Though I believed this curriculum to be effective for guiding students to deep understandings of mathematics, I questioned how I could go beyond the printed units to best assess students’ prior knowledge, differentiate instruction to meet various students’ needs, and to move students further along the continuum of mathematical understanding. These questions became the focus of my masters’ project.