Georgia Performance Standards (GPS – 7th grade)
M7N1. Students will understand the meaning of positive and negative rational numbers and use them in computation.
National Council for Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM)
Number and Operations Standard for Grades 6–8
Develop meaning for integers & represent / compare quantities with them.
Number and Operations Standard for Grades 3–5
Explore numbers less than 0 by extending the number line and through familiar applications. Negative integers should be introduced at this level through use of familiar models such as temperature or owing money. The number line is also an appropriate and helpful model, and students should recognize that points to the left of 0 on a horizontal number line can be represented by numbers less than 0.