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Teachers can learn a great deal about their students'
level of conceptual understanding and reasoning
skills by monitoring small group and whole class
discussion. The teacher who knows what to ask and
when to listen can gather useful evidence about
students' understanding, and can use that evidence
to determine next steps in teaching. Consider the
teacher's role in the whole class discussion described
below, from a combined fifth and sixth grade classroom.
The students are investigating the fractional relationships
among cubes and rods of different size. Their explanations
refer to the relationship among two cubes, where
five of the small cubes fit along one side of the
large cube.
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