Category: High School: Functions

Slope of Parallel and Perpendicular Lines

Why is this mistake attractive to the student? How could you make it unattractive?

Thanks to Tina Cardone for the submission.

What’s interesting about these mistakes?

What’s the mistake? How would you help?

Thanks to John Weisenfeld for the submission.

The submitter of this mistake reports that the student is a “high flyer.”

What is this student’s confusion?
Why made this mistake so tempting? After all, if a student just doesn’t understand “slope” there are a million things that they could do wrong. Why this one?

Thanks to Jeff de Varona for the submission. Go check out his blog and follow him on twitter.

What does the student know, and what does he misunderstand? How would you help?

Today’s submission comes via Christopher Danielson, who blogs at Overthinking my teaching.

What does the student understand about recursive functions? What’s she confused by? How would you help?

What does the student know? What’s the mistake? How would you help?

How do you teach function notation? How would you help your students avoid this sort of mistake?

Say something intelligent about this bit of student work.

What does this mistake reveal about the kid’s thinking? How would you take the kid’s thinking to the next level?