Summary and Synthesis

Eled 330 has had helped me to see a whole new perspective on the way to teach math. I didn’t think that it was wrong, nor did I necessarily think it was right, to teach math right out of the book; I am not sure of how I thought was the perfect way to teach math. Being in class over the last few Tuesdays and Thursdays, has brought some insight to me on how to teach math in the correct manner. I, as well of many of my classmates, grew up learning math right out of the book, rarely doing any activities that were not located in the book. If a student did not understand the math problem, then the class continued with math and the student could receive more assistance from the teacher at a later time; there were not multiple entry points for the diverse learners in the classroom. I never remember math dealing with a lot of problem solving either, more memorization than anything else. Now on the other hand, the correct way to teach math is to involve deeper level thinking that engages students, allows students to relate to the math problems brought to their attention, and has several different entry points for the diverse group of learners in the classroom. Students need to use a variety of strategies to come to a solution and the students should also be able to converse with his or her peers about the problem so they can see how their peers approached the same problem in a different way. The teacher should also not give the students the solution to a problem right away rather give the students time to work alone on the math problem, and then allow them to convene with neighbors. The correct way to teach math, that was just previously described, will take deeper level thinking from the teacher than I thought. Math has always been the easiest subject for me in school and I have always enjoyed it thoroughly, but recently in Eled 330 I have become frustrated because I am not used to the deeper level thinking that we are doing; I am upset that I was unprepared for this due to previous schooling. My hope is that if my students were to take this course, they would not get as frustrated as I did working on some of the math problems because I will have prepared them enough for different math problems that are thrown at them.

Summary and Synthesis

Over the past several classes, I have learned numerous things about teaching math. Before, I thought math was just taught by the traditional "here is a problem, here is how you solve it, now you do it on your own," type of way. Now I know that if I want to teach math in such a way that my students will benefit from it, I have to teach them different strategies to approach mathematics. The strategies that were taught in class were somewhat new to me. I have heard and used some of them when I was in high school math class. I had a teacher that was very great at helping students learn new strategies on how to solve a problem, but not necessarily give them the answers or routes in which they should take. Math takes skill and strategies and in order for students to understand mathematics completely, we, as teachers, have to help them get there. We have to help them develop the skills so that they can find a strategy that works for them. That doesn't mean that we give them the strategy to use, it means that we guide them in the right direction. We teach them the problem solving process which is to first understand the problem completely, then to devise a plan to solve the problem, next, carry out the plan you chose, and lastly, take a look back at the strategy used and the route taken to get the answer. Teaching students valuable strategies and skills will help them to be better at math, it will show them the importance on figuring out situations and problems without having someone to hold their hand.

Summary & Synthesis

During the past few weeks of class, I have come to realize that I need take a step back and re-evaluate how I am going to teach math within my future classroom. All I have ever known about ways to teach math is what I observed in elementary school and high school. The same approaches were used class after class and year after year: the teacher provides step-by-step examples and then assisgns an abundance of similar problems for students to practice. However, after the short time spent in this course, I now understand the importance of teaching students how to problem solve rather than just practice the steps that were shown to them. By doing so, students are able to make their own interpretations and use their own approaches and background knowledge when solving problems. As we discussed in class, when teaching problem solving skills, we, as teachers, need to have several goals in mind: we need to help students recognize when various strategies are appropriate and when to use them, and we need to help students become capable of inventing their own strategies and adapting existing strategies. In simplest terms, this means that we need to provide students with the skills they need to come up with their own ways to solve problems rather than telling them how they 'should' be solving the problems.