Building Thinking Classrooms 2025 Annual Conference

Estimation should be more than a warm-up—it’s a powerful mathematical habit that sharpens number sense, nurtures reasonableness, and helps students make sense of the world. Join us as we engage with estimation as a thinking practice through rich problems. We’ll clarify the differences between estimation, approximation, and rounding, and explore how estimation can activate that inner voice—that mathematical Jiminy Cricket—that tells us when an answer just doesn’t feel right. Along the way, we’ll analyze student tasks, reframe them through a BTC lens, and reflect on what it takes to support these practices across classrooms. Drawing from our experiences in curriculum and practice design, we’ll close with a look at how structured materials can uphold BTC principles, especially in contexts where teachers have different styles, experience levels, or support.