First We Understand: Trig Origami 10-12

All Math starts as a picture in your mind… a way to see the problem, a way to hold the numbers still while you look for the relationships that you can use to answer the question: Why? But somehow, by High School, math is too often more about "finding answers" than about finding "why". Grade 10 is the first time students experience Trigonometry... too often, it is introduced as memorizing SOH-CAH-TOA, as a purely symbolic exercise that handicaps kids with trust issues... "Where did that number come from? Why is sin(30) = 0.500? Where did my calculator learn to generate magic numbers?" We know kids learn from Concrete to Representational to Abstract (C-R-A), but too often, we teach Trig backwards... A-R-C, and then wonder why kids It doesn't have to be that way. Trig Origami helps to create a visual framework for the learners, a sense of the behaviours of Trigonometry. Rather than a race to chose the right formulas, to follow rules, to avoid those costly 'stupid' mistakes, they can start to use intuition as much as calculation. … But First, we Understand