New Insights and Their Implications

This class has been quite an eye-opener so far. I thought this class was going to be fairly simple because math has always been one of my better subjects but I have come to find that this class is more than math concepts. Instead of simply finding an answer and moving on, I've learned to take a step back and think about the why's and how's. For instance, the activity we did with the shapes seemed very simple, until we discussed it in class. I never noticed a pattern with our data at all until the class discussion. Even then, it wasn't about finding the pattern, it was why and how this pattern existed that was important. It's not always about the right answers but the methods and strategies used to get that answer. Also, I've learned that the content standards used for mathematics in South Dakota are not very well written. The discussion we had the other day about state and national standards was pretty interesting. I never really thought about standards in that much detail - always took them for what they were. I have really learned to consider both standards in order to give my students a more thorough education.