I gave my students our learning progression for SMP 8 a few weeks ago as we started a unit on Right Triangles and had a lesson specifically on 45-45-90 Special Right Triangles.
The Geometry Nspired Activity Special Right Triangles contains an Action-Consequence document that focuses students attention on what changes and what stays the same. The big idea is this: students take some kind of action on an object (like grabbing and dragging a point or a graph). Then they pay attention to what happens. What changes? What stays the same? Through reflection and conversation, students make connections between multiple representations of the mathematics to make sense of the mathematics.
Students start with what they know – the Pythagorean Theorem.
Looking at the side lengths in a chart helps students notice and note what changes and what stays the same:
The legs of the triangle are always the same length.
As the legs increase, the hypotenuse increases.
The hypotenuse is always the longest side.
Students begin to identify and describe patterns and regularities:
All of the hypotenuses have √2.
The ratio of the hypotenuse to the leg is √2.
Students practice look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning as they generalize what is true:
To get from the leg to the hypotenuse, multiply by √2.
To get from the hypotenuse to the leg, divide by √2.
hypotenuse = leg * √2
Teachers and students have to be careful with look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning. Are we providing students an opportunity to work with diagrams and measurements that make us attend to precision as we express the regularity in repeated reasoning that we notice?
In a Math Practice journal, Kaci writes about “look for regularity in repeated reasoning”. We figured out that half of a square is a 45-45-90 triangle, and students were trying to determine the other two sides of the triangle given one side length of the triangle. She says “To find the length of the hypotenuse, you take the length of a side and multiply by √2. The √2 will always be in the hypotenuse even though it may not be seen like √2. In her examples, the triangle to the left has √2 shown in the hypotenuse, but the triangle to the right has √2 in the answer even though it isn’t shown, since 3√2√2 is not in lowest form. She says, “I looked for regularity in repeated reasoning and found an interesting answer.”
What opportunities can we provide our students this week to look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning and find out something interesting?
Easing the Hurry Syndrome 
howardat58
April 7, 2015 at 9:29 pm
I am still having a problem with the meaning of ” look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning”. Maybe, since the word “pattern” has become associated only with pictorial, graphical and geometric stuff it cannot be used in this context- pity really, since “repeated reasoning” is a bizarre phrase. maybe it’s American English !