The concept of graphing trigonometric functions contains one of the biggest shifts in mathematical thought for students in secondary mathematics. Students have just been introduced to radian measure after years of working with degree measure. The unit circle is unveiled on the coordinate plane and students are taught that the coordinates of points along its circumference can be represented as
Using Graphs to Relate Two Quantities…and Create a Chorus of Laughter
One of my favorite lessons to teach middle school students is how to use a graph to relate two quantities. This is usually the first time students have created a graph from scratch to represent a real-life scenario. Many of them have prior experience creating graphs from other math classes, but my experience has been that