Most of what was covered in this lesson was information I already knew. One concept I am having a difficult time with is the Break it Up mental math strategy. It looks complicated to me and not something i could do as mentally. Isn't that the point of mental math, is to do it in your head?
Maybe that is a misconception I have. When I think mental math, I am thinking of problems I can do in my head without writing it down on paper. However, I find it very important for students to write down the process to which they got to an answer. The examples in the lesson for Break it Up, weren't problems I would expect students to do "mentally," I would expect to see their work on paper.
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Ok, so talking with Teresa in class, I am starting to see why use the Break it Up strategy. It was easier to look at it in an array. But I still have a question whether or not this is considered a mental math strategy.
Yes, I understand what you are saying, however you have to understand "mental math" in order to break it up and then you use mental math to compute the smaller parts. Does that make sense? The idea is to make it as simple as possible-even though some of us may revert to a paper and pencil to combine the parts.
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