teaching also emphasizes the first goal of having students realize that mathematics concepts are used everywhere; mathematics is valuable for the power it gives users to understand the real world.
The goal of having students learn to value mathematics is difficult to objectify because it involves placing an intrinsic value on subject matter without an easy method of verifying if a student values the subject. Given this difficulty in testing whether a student values mathematics, a teacher can present students with multiple and varied uses of mathematical concepts which are not limited to the segment of the day labeled math study. Mathematics uses several forms of representation which are taught or reviewed during the fourth grade: arithmetic expressions, tables, graphs, and equations (Hale & Saxon, 1996; Greeno & Hall, 1997, p. 361). Information from other areas of study can be and often is presented using these forms of representation. The relationship between animals in an ecosystem (4th grade science) can be shown on a line graph, or as an equation saying that f
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