Cartoon Network. (2010, April 5). Slumber Party Panic [screenshot]. Retrieved from Adventure Time S01E01

However, as it turns out, patterning can be solved using algebra! Algebra itself is about solving patterns. Using the game Guess My Rule, I began to make these connections, that I had not considered before.

EDUC 8P28. (2016, October 31). Week 7 [presentation slide]. Retrieved from Sakai.

Guess My Rule features kid-friendly robot characters that ask kids to guess what "code" they used to compute patterns. This is where the proverbial light bulb went off in my mind. The rule of the patterns is an algebraic equation. Prior to this week, I had never seen this concept displayed so plainly. Perhaps I had always known that patterning involved algebra of some kind, but it had never been made as clear as this simple statement, prior to Guess My Rule.

Because I had always felt rather confident about my abilities as a "pattern solver", I suddenly gained a new-found confidence in my abilities to solve algebraic equations. I think many students could benefit from relating patterns and algebra as well. When kids realize that solving for "x" is like searching for the next step in a pattern, they will feel less intimidated algebra.

Guess My Rule can also work in reverse, by having students create visual representations of algebraic equations. In class we used coloured blocks to do this, and then asked our classmates to guess what algebraic expression we were attempting to physically model.

E. Inrig. (2016, October 31). Modelling Patterns [photograph]. Retrieved from iPhone.

It was interesting to see the different ways people used visual representations for algebraic equations. I was one of the few who stacked the squares, but many laid their pieces out or created interesting patterns or shapes within their given equation. Again, I am reminded that there is no one way to go about mathematics.