The Show Your Work Battle.

Write now, I am fighting the age old battle of getting lower performing students to show their work.  I have a few students who refuse to show their work because they know the answer.  All the work I've given them so far have included the answers so they can check their work as they go.  When you have the answers, its easy to figure out the solution.

I've had them work a few problems without the answers available to check and they run into problems. They don't buy the "Its easier to find a mistake if everything is written out" or "if the problems are more complex it is not as easy to do in your head so if you work on learning steps now, when you need them, you'll know them".  I also fear they want to wait till they get home to run the problems through one of those apps that shows them the steps and the answers.

So I have two choices here, let them just put the answers down without showing their work and count it totally wrong or continue fighting the battle.  Honestly, I'm not ready to go that way yet, because the group I work with have struggled with math and I'm trying to help them build a better foundation.  So I've come up with a few ideas that will keep them "showing their work" while learning the steps so they are prepared for more complex problems.  These activities are for two step equations and higher.

1.  Divide the students up into groups of four,  Each person in the group is assigned a number from one to four and each is given a problem.  The first person writes the problem on the board.  The second person performs the next step, the third person will write the next step and the fourth person writes the answer.

2x + 1 = 7
     -1.     -1
 2x = 6 
 2.      2
   x =3

When they've finished the problem, they can all write it down.  For the next problem, The second person begins by writing the problem, the third person does the first step, the fourth person completes the second step and the first person writes the answer.  They continue with the third person beginning the a problem, and cycles through.  This way each person has a chance to do every step of the process over four problems.  At the end they will have four problems completed and they can begin the process again for another four problems.

2.  Set up slides so the first person writes the equation, the slide is duplicated so the second person adds the second line, the slide is duplicated again with the two steps so the third person adds the third line, the slide is duplicated again and the fourth person writes the answer.  At the end the slides are connected with transitions to create a video and they can add a voice over explaining each step.

3. If a student thinks they know the answer, they can verbally explain their thinking on how they came up with the answer while writing down the answer.  I think if they can explain how they got their answer, that will work just as well as showing all the steps.


These are just three ideas I've come up with to get students to learn to show work because once we add in the distributive property, like terms on both sides , throwing in some absolute value and a few other things, it is not as easy to do it all in their heads. By learning to show it with the simpler problems, they know what they should be doing to solve the problems.

Let me know what you think, I'd love to hear.  Have a great day.