Summary and Synthesis

These past few weeks have really opened my mind to a new way of teaching math. I will admit, once I entered middle school, math quickly became a subject that I was not confident in at all. That lack of confidence also made me a little nervous to take is this class, too. I've come to realize though, mostly through this class, that the main reason behind my shaky feelings is because math has been primarily a memorization task. We were given a formula, then we repeatedly practiced computing it. However, this class has shown me that math is a process of discovery; of questioning and developing an understanding of core mathematical principles that we can relate to. It has caused me to open my eyes and see that there is a lot more to math than I previously thought. The activities that we have done in class have been very interesting. They have made it evident that we do not need to be clinging to the formulas and procedures that the teachers give us, but that we can create the answers on our own with guidance from them instead. Therefore, I am very interested to see how this semester will progress. I am excited to learn this new match teaching style (even though it will probably be a struggle along the way), and most importantly, I am interested to use this method with my future students.