S.P.U.R.

I love acronyms!  They make things so easy to remember.  So I was excited when a colleague of mine sent me an article to read called Multidimensional Assessment of CCSSM by Sara K. Bleiler and Denisse R. Thompson from Teaching Children Mathematics .  It talks about measuring the depth of students' understanding of math concepts.  It introduced the acronym  S.P.U.R.  She and her colleagues at school decided they would use this acronym as a reminder for the kinds of questions that they should be asking their students during math to check for the depth of understanding that they have about the concept being taught.  It makes for great formative assessment.  To this end, they created from the article a kind of a reminder card to keep in each teacher's plan book and by each teacher's ELMO for use when planning or teaching.
Here's what S.P.U.R. stands for:
S - Skills:  Procedures, such as carrying out one-step or multiple -step algorithrms, inventing new algorithms, and using technology to perform mathematical calculations - ie.  24 x _?__ = 48.
P - Properties:  The underlying theories and principles of mathematics, often requiring students to identify or apply mathematical justification - ie.  What does the 4 in 341 represent?
U - Uses:  Real world application which oftern means expecting students to develop models to describe the mathematics.  ie.  word problems
R - Representations:  Visual depictions of mathematical concepts, such as graphs, pictures of geometric figures, or statistical plots. - ie.  any visual models
The article gives concrete examples of each of these for multiple grade levels.  Highly informative!  Be sure to check it out in its entirety.