Blog #1

     At the beginning of the course I felt like we would be taking another typical methods class, but now that we have started I see that we are learning much more.  I started off thinking that teaching math was as simple as teaching the students how to solve a problem and having them practice.  Now I know that there is a process involved.  I really learned a lot from the discussion we had on problem solving.  Now that we mentioned metacognition, it makes sense to motivate students to be more conscious of how they are working on solving problems.  I have never really thought about knowing how I know which steps to use, but now that I think about it there is a lot more of a process involved.  Looking at the ten strategies, they make sense! I never thought about using them as strategies to solving problems, but now that I think about it, I have used almost every single strategy in one way or another.  Now that I am conscious of the strategies I use to solve problems, I can use my knowledge to model/assist my students on how to use the 10 strategies to problem solving.
     Another thing I have learned is how to teach students without giving away the answers.  It's important to have the students work through problems on their own and get their own answer.  When students ask for help it's easy to just show them how to do the problem and give them the answer.  By working on the problems in class, I learned how to guide the students and have them figure everything out independently.  I have always been a huge math fan but it makes me nervous to teach students who don't like math.  With this class I'm already feeling more comfortable with teaching my students.