Task writing contest

At the Illustrative Mathematics Project, we have been planning to invite people to submit tasks for a “standard of the week.” We decided to make it a bit more interesting, and would like to announce the first round of our Standards Task Writing Contest beginning Tuesday, December 13th, 2011. The theme for this week is the K-8 functions stream (see pp 21-23 in “Examples of Structure in the Common Core State Standards’ Standards for Mathematical Content” by Jason Zimba). Some of the standards in this stream already have illustrations (see 6.RP.3, 7.RP.2, 7.RP.3, 8.EE.5) but most do not. People are invited to submit tasks for these standards:

  • 3.OA.9
  • 4.OA.5
  • 5.OA.3
  • 6.EE.9
  • 7.RP.1
  • 8.F.4

Authors of tasks selected for inclusion in the Illustrative Mathematics task bank will receive $200 per task (not per author, sorry!) and must be emailed by Monday, December 19th midnight in your local time zone to illustrativemathematics@gmail.com with subject line “Submission for Illustrative Mathematics Task Writing Contest Dec 12 – Dec 19, 2011.” If your task is accepted, we will notify you the week following the deadline. We may ask you to work with us to revise the task before we accept it.  People may submit multiple tasks. Any questions about the contest should be sent to the same email address with subject line “Question about Illustrative Mathematics Task Writing Contest Dec 12 – Dec 19, 2011.”

How it Should Look

All task submissions must include at least one complete solution. We will give extra consideration to tasks written by pairs or teams of people, tasks that have natural connections to other tasks related to this stream, and tasks with insightful commentary. Please submit tasks in word format or LaTeX, along with a pdf if possible. Here is a word_template. 

Things You Should Know Before Submitting

Writing a great task is an art, and tasks often benefit from multiple revisions. It would be helpful to read some of the tasks that have already been accepted at http://illustrativemathematics.org. To learn more about what makes a good mathematical task, read this article by Kristin Umland.

We look forward to reading your tasks!

5 thoughts on “Task writing contest

  1. Just looked over this document quickly and it looks very interesting. I did notice at the
    beginning it promises a section III on a graph of the standards and the
    document ends after section II. Is there another page with a large graph
    that didn’t get included?

  2. Pingback: Common Core Task Writing Contest « Dr. Nicki's Guided Math Blog

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