It was fun for me to see them realize they had learned something throughout the unit because they could now correctly do all of the problems. Many sort of freaked out and several others were convinced that some of the problems were actually correct. After going over the sheet, I asked my students to think back to their reaction when I first gave them the worksheet. On one of the last days of the unit, we went over the correct answers as a class for the first time. (I know I found someone else’s version of this worksheet that I modified, but I can’t remember where I got it.) This was something we came back to periodically throughout the unit. I started the unit with a modified version of Andrew Stadel’s exponent mistakes worksheet.
This is one of the things I struggle ensuring as a teacher -that after my students have noticed patterns, they still understand what is actually happening. Yes, I want my students to notice patterns, but not at the expense of understanding the math they are doing. Many students still said things like, “Oh, so when you divide, you subtract the exponents.” I have mixed feelings over this. This was the first time I’ve taught exponents without explicitly telling students the “rules” at some point within the unit.
