Quadrilaterals: Transformations for Developing Student Thinking

Abstract

First paragraph: Students begin learning about transformations in the early elementary grades. They might create simple tessellations by cutting and pasting cardboard pieces, or investigate symmetry by folding figures on patty paper (Common Core State Standards [CCSS] 4.G.3). Their knowledge and ease with transformations continues to grow through middle school, where the everyday language of turn, flip, slide, bigger and smaller is connected with the corresponding mathematical terminology of rotation, reflection, translation, and dilation (National Council of Teachers of Mathematics [NCTM] 2000). By the end of middle school, students should be able to describe the effect of transformations on two-dimensional figures (CCSS 8.G.3).