Natalie Haller, Zach Rider, Libby De Jardin

MA 312

Dr. Pothast

4/13/15

Math Curriculum Study for First Grade Geometry

Geometry is something that is needed for students to understand the relationships

between shapes in our world. Many math problems that students are going to experience in their

future career have to deal with geometry in some way. We are focusing on the first grade

geometry topic, and many of the things that students need to learn at this grade level are basic

information that will help them in their everyday life. To start out teachers need to get students to

understand the basic idea of shapes, because our entire world is made up of a variety of different

shapes. Allowing students to get a basic understanding of shapes allows them to see the world

around them in a different way. Before students are educated in the field of geometry it can be

difficult for some students to completely understand shapes. Students can understand what a

shape looks like, but they do not always understand the characteristics of it, such as how many

sides, corners, and what thickness or color. They can become confused easily, so it is very

important as teachers to properly and effectively teach students about geometry. Adult

perceptions on geometry were developed by a guide known as the Common Core, which lead to

teaching through effective instruction starting in first grade.

Geometry and measurement is essential and meaningful mathematics in lives of

individuals regardless of age (Cawley, Foley & Hayes, 2009). For adults that are educated, it is

easy to identify which object is what shape and be able to tell us specific characteristics about the
shape. For example, if you are at a table you can know that it is a square, because it has four

sides and all of the sides are equal length; as a student these concepts are not always there. The

table scenario doesnt work to a student that does not have a concept of what shapes are and what

their identifying features are. This concept is very abstract and hard for them to understand.

Throughout elementary school students are exposed to shapes, allowing them to recognize

characteristics and discover the difference from one shape to the next (Browning, Edson,

Kimani, & Aslan-Tutak, n.d.). Children have the opportunity to discover shapes and it is

important to make this topic interesting for students so that they stay engaged throughout their

schooling career (Browning, Edson, Kimani, & Aslan-Tutak, n.d.). Since shapes are in

everything we use and in our surroundings all the time, it is important to teach this concept to

students at an early age. Students can first explore shapes when they are young through the

human face, which is circular. Buildings, flowers, and toys all have different shapes that kids

can explore and see (Science for All Americans, 1989). Kids explore the world first and then

want to know how to describe it. Learning how to describe the world through shapes can be

beneficial for understanding the world.

Geometry is important to teach for a lot of reasons. Geometry helps with everyday life

and gives us a way to describe things without numbers. Secondly, geometry helps enhance

cognitive performance, communication process, and language comprehension. Lastly, geometry

is a big factor in social mathematics, which deals with the interactions and behavior (Cawley,

Foley, & Hayes, 2009). The best way to understand geometry is through classroom education.

In the book In Language in the Mathematics Classroom: Talking, Representing,

Recording by Griffiths and Clyne they talk about how to effectively communicate in the math

classroom. When teaching on the subject of geometry, it is important to use proper terminology
so that your students can learn proper terminology for their future (Griffiths, & Clyne, 1994).

Also when teaching math to students of such a young age it is also important that you are able to

communicate completely and fully. It is also crucial that when giving instructions you are clear

and there is no confusion, because if your instructions are unclear that can cause confusion with

what to do, which will result in the students being confused with the subject at hand (Griffiths &

Clyne, 1994).

It is important to focus on specific items involved with each math topic so that students can

move from grade to grade with as little confusion from the students as possible. It is an important

job of a teacher to try and teach to the students as effectively as possible by knowing how the

students mind is working (Browning, Edson, Kimani, & Aslan-Tutak, F.). It is important to make

sure that teachers teach students the proper information and that they keep up with the Common

Core and can advance at the proper rate. In the article it talks about how it is important to look at

and see that how you teach the topic of geometry differs from grade level to grade level, at the

first grade level it is important to give a basic understanding and to make learning about shapes

and geometry fun (Browning, Edson, Kimani, & Aslan-Tutak, n.d.).

Characteristics and thinking about shapes and how much space they take up, are two very

abstract things that some students cannot conceptually understand. The amount of space that an

object takes up is confusing for students, because if they understand measurement and how long

the sides are they can add it up, but it is still confusing that the object takes up a different amount

of space then how long its sides are (Cruikshank, Fitzgerald, & Jenson, n.d.). In the article Young

Children Learning Mathematics it talks about how students can view shapes at different levels.

Some students view shapes at a deep level while some can only comprehend shapes at a very

simple level. Another thing that the article Young Children Learning Mathematics talks about is
building a strong foundation for geometry, so that when students look at more complicated topics

they will have a strong background in the topic and will be able to perform math with a deeper

and more understanding level (Cruikshank, Fitzgerald & Jenson, n.d.).

Geometry is an important topic to teach in elementary school because not only does it build

into more advanced topics later in their career, but it also improves different skills such as special

relations, visualization, and orientation (Marchis, 2012). Marchis talks about how geometry can

allow students to grow with the ability to understand the relation between space and shapes. As

talked about earlier, this is a difficult topic for them to grasp so it is important to try and get

students to improve with their skills. In Marchis article he also talks about how it is important to

give students a visual and allow them to think about geometry in a visual way. Students who

think abstractly gain understand geometry in a more clear way (Marchis, 2012).

In the Iowa Core the main focus of first grade geometry is to reason with shapes and look at

their attributes. This cluster stems into more specific standards, such as distinguishing between

defining attributes, building or composing two dimensional or three dimensional shapes, and

separating shapes into two or four equal shares (Iowa core. n.d.). While looking at the Iowa Core

for our research we were able to build lessons that we would teach to a first grade classroom in

the topic of geometry. The Iowa Core gave us a good idea of where to start with students in a

first grade classroom in order not to overwhelm them, while still being able to keep their

attention and keep them engaged with the topic at hand (Iowa core. n.d.).

Mathematics in the K-8 Classroom and Library by McKinney and Hinton talks about the

different levels that students will learn about geometry. In this article the authors also touch on

activities that will help students learn in the best way that they can, whether that be visually

abstract or more concretely (McKinney & Hinton, 2010). This article talks about how using a
different variety of strategies in order to teach geometry can allow for students to learn to the

best of their ability regardless of what kind of learner they may be (McKinney & Hinton, 2010).

When teachers plan their lesson we look at how to help them for their future educational

endeavors. However, Navigating Through Algebra in Prekindergarten- Grade 2, talks about how

past teaching moments, regardless of their topic, can help what you teach and how the child

learns now (Greenes, 2001). Greenes talks about fair trading by talking about algebra and how

when showing equations both sides have to be equal to one another. He then connects the

concept of the equal sign in algebra to how you can talk to students about how different shapes

can be made to be equal to one another, so that they gain a better understanding of spatial

reasoning (Greenes, 2001). Greenes shows that in future classroom experiences when talking

about pattern blocks and how they relate to math you will need at least a basic understanding in

geometry. This article shows how important teaching strategies are in a school system, because a

variety of topics can be used in conjunction with one another in order to help students make

more clear connections (Greenes, 2001). By exploring techniques which develop this

algebraic/geometry rapprochement, problems in geometry can be rephrased algebraically while

algebraic relations can be given a geometric meaning. (Paulos, 1991).

In the book Connect to NCTM standards 2000: making the standards work at grade 1

it talks about how we need to connect our teachings and be able to have the students knowledge

match up with the standards for math. This book has a variety of objectives and practices that

you can use in your classroom that will be helpful in allowing your students to keep up with the

Iowa Core and the standards of education (Fennell, Bamberger, Rowan, Sammons, & Suarez,

2000). In this book they show you activities that you can use that will help students follow the

standard of reasoning with shapes and their attributes. The book elaborates on how you need to
be able to give the students information about different characteristics that each shape has so that

students can use that knowledge to identify a shape even if it is an extreme size or at a different

orientation than they are used to seeing the shape (Fennell, Bamberger, Rowan, Sammons, &

Suarez, 2000). In this book they connect previous standards involved with geometry such as the

kindergarten standard of being able to identify a shape like a square, rectangle, or circle. This

connects very closely to the first grade standard of being able to look at shapes and distinguish

between their attributes. This book elaborates on the connections teachers can make, but also

talks about how teachers elaborate on the standard from previous years and take it one step

further (Fennell, Bamberger, Rowan, Sammons, & Suarez, 2000). Taking it one step farther by

making tasks for students dealing with real life examples is an effective way to develop

geometric understanding (Godfry and Siddons, 2001). We focused on the Iowa Core domain

geometry.

Geometry is a branch of math that addresses spatial sense and geometric reasoning (Howse &

Howse, 2015). Howse and Howse explore how the Van Hiele Theory links to instruction in

Teaching Children Mathematics (2015). The effective instruction that they explored consisted of

five different levels, which were completed in the order that students learn and explore the

concepts of geometry. The first phase the article talked about was information which was talked

about on day one. Information is the phase when the students learn the vocab and the concepts

needed for the activity. During this lesson described in the article the students were sorting

geometric blocks into different categories of their choice. They then shared how they organized

the blocks with each other. Children organized their shapes by shape, size, color, corners, sides,

etc. The important part of the information stage was the discussion that took place among the

students with each other and the teacher. The assessment of this stage was through the
discussion, which the teacher could determine how well a student was understanding sorting the

shapes (Howse & Howse, 2015).

The second phase of learning through the Van Hiele theory was directed orientation,

which was taught on the second day. This was a teacher-directed task for the students to gain

understanding. The shapes were described with attributes by color, thickness, and shape (Howse

& Howse, 2015). Libby, Zach and I also saw something similar to this done in our field

experience, where the kids would have to name the attributes of the shape that they were given

although, in the article, the kids demonstrated what they learned by putting shapes in a Venn

Diagram rather than just naming them. The third phase was explanation, in which the students

had to using reasoning skills to why they put the shapes in the category they did on the Venn

Diagram. Explaining the attributes was especially difficult when the teacher gave them two

categories that had both of the traits. The key aspect of this stage is how the kids explain why the

shapes were in that particular category (Howse & Howse, 2015).

The fourth phase of the Van Hiele phases of learning is free orientation. This is when the

students get to pick any way to sort their shapes. The last phase is integrations. The students had

to randomly draw the seven attribute blocks. Than the students had to take turns placing blocks

in the correct category. The goal of this game was to be the first to get rid of all the attribute

blocks (Howse & Howse, 2015). The unit that is based on our research follows the Van Hiele

phases as closely as possible. Van Hiele phases connect learning with teaching in the classroom.

Students are learning through exploring the concepts, but also from direct teaching from the

teacher. Students are developing the concepts needed to understand geometry.

Not only are the Van Hiele phases an effective way of teaching, but they can also be

broken down into levels, which was discussed in an article by Marchis called Preservice
Primary School Teachers Elementary Geometry Knowledge. Level 1 is visualization which

focuses on naming and identifying shapes. Level 2 is analysis, this focuses on recognizing

shapes by properties. Level 3 is abstraction and focuses on concepts, such as squares are

rectangles, but all rectangles are not squares. Level 4 is deduction, which is proofs. Lastly, level

5 is rigor, which discusses the relations between geometrical concepts and looking at abstract

systems (Marchis, 2012). Digging deeper into this article there are three elements of spatial

ability which are effective instructions. The first is spatial relations, which discusses the

relationship between objects and space. The second is visualization, looking at two-dimensional

and three-dimensional spaces. The third element is orientation, which is understanding geometric

shapes from different positions (Marchis, 2012). In our unit we tied in two-dimensional shapes

and three-dimensional shapes, and looked at some of the similarities and the differences.

Visualization was a key thing in our lesson because we had hands on shapes and pictures to show

symmetry.

Orientation brings on some misconceptions, with kids, that makes learning difficult.

Students struggle to see shapes in different orientations. Students also dont understand

inclusion of shapes. Meaning that they can comprehend that a square is not a rhombus and a

rectangle is not a parallelogram. This article discusses that having concept definitions helps with

these misconceptions. A concept definition is a form of words used to specify the concepts

(Marchis, 2012). Developing concept definitions is beneficial for understanding geometric

mathematics. In our unit we have a shape bulletin board, which has the clear definitions of the

shapes. When discussing symmetry we talk about what symmetry means. Having the students

understand the definitions of the shapes helps with not mixing up shape attributes.
 The book Connect to NCTM standards 2000: making the standards work at grade 1

confirms this misconception, one of the most common mistakes made is that if you rotate a shape

or move a shape many students do not understand that it is still the same shape. To combat that

you need to focus on teaching the different attributes that a shape has so that no matter the

orientation or location of the shape they will always understand that it is still, in fact, the same

shape as before the translation or transformation (Fennell, Bamberger, Rowan, Sammons, &

Suarez, 2000).

Another way to help students understand the key concepts is relating shapes to the

environment. Cruikshank, Fitzgerald, and Janson give incite in their book about things to do to

help students with understanding space and shapes (1980). This book discusses the importance

of encouraging the student to build, providing them materials to construct, looking at body

movement, and playing. From ages 3-5 kids learn from their environment, which will later help

them get more in-depth with geometry concepts. From age 5-7 children are developing the

ability to reproduce shapes without changing the characteristics or attributes of those shapes

(Crukshank, Fitgerald & Janson, n.d.). This is what we talk about in our lessons when we talk

about the different attributes of shapes. Childrens growth is understanding geometric ideas is

nurtured as they enter the age period of seven to nine years (Crukshank, Fitgerald & Janson,

n.d.). Understanding how kids perceive and develop geometric ideas through the early years of

education is important.

Children perceive geometry in two different ways, Topology and the Euclidean.

Topology is the study of space concerned with portions or locations, where space and length

may be altered without affecting a figures basic properties of being open or closed (Crukshank,

Fitgerald & Janson, n.d.). While Euclidean geometry deals with the study of figures that are
closed in space and are rigid, kids go from a topology perspective to a Euclidean perspective

through the ages discussed earlier in the is article (Crukshank, Fitgerald & Janson, n.d.).

Euclidean is metric and focuses on shapes and the rules that pertain to shapes. The three levels

of reasoning of geometry in Geometry and Measurement: a Discussion of Status and Content

Options for Elementary School Students with Learning Disabilities article were resemblance,

attributes and properties. Resemblance focused on using the informal language age to describe

characters. After the students get done with these steps, the teacher would go in and talk about

the different attributes and then the properties of geometry (Cawley, Foley, & Hayes, 2009) By

going through the Van Hiele stages you are changing kids perspective on space from Topology

to Euclidean geometry. The exploration of space is the classic example of early mental growth

(Crukshank, Fitgerald & Janson, n.d.).

The article continued to discuss how the meaningful and higher order understanding of

geometry and measurement are gained by a stress on the episodic learning activities in contrast

to semantic activities (Cawley, Foley, & Hayes, 2009). The meaning here is getting students to

think at a higher level by comprehending geometry at a higher level. Some basic levels would be

that students understand the name of the shapes and can be able to draw the shapes to illustrate

what they know. Higher level understanding would be able to sort the shapes by shape, color,

and size. Not only would they have to sort the shapes, but they would have to be able to explain

why the shape is in that category (Cawley, Foley, & Hayes, 2009). In our lessons we make it

clear that the students have to be able to understand the different attributes and be able to explain

them.

The Van Hiele phases and levels helped shape our lesson plans by showing us effective

instruction techniques. Through the misconceptions we learned how to avoid confusion among
the first graders. The Iowa Core was our foundation on building lessons that were backed by

level of understanding of first graders. The importance of geometry in our society is to help

describe the world and it is used in every age. First grade geometry is the beginning of

understanding our environment through mathematics.