New Insights and Their Implications

This math course is definitely much different than any other math class I have ever taken. I am learning new perspectives on math concepts that I was once very confident that I understood. When we do example problems in class or go over homework problems I am surprised to see strategies that I never considered from my peers. It is surprising because I always thought everyone basically thought through problems the same way and took very similar routes to achieving those results. My previous belief has certainly been disproven. It is important to work with partners and in groups because it encourages students to share ideas and learn new methods for solving problems. Other math classes I have been in, both high school and college, were focused on individual work and involved little or no group work. However, there would not have been much reason for group work because all we would have done is take turns plugging numbers into a formula. Not a lot of higher thinking or reasoning involved.

Before the first day of Math Methods I was pretty sure that the class was going to be a hybrid of Math Concepts I and II with the addition of students teaching lessons. Clearly, I was mistaken. The instructor is introducing mathematical concepts that I know how to solve and then poses questions about these concepts that are foreign to me. This causes me to, basically, relearn these math concepts in a way that I actually understand the “why” questions of solving a problem. For example: why do we use pie to find the area of a circle or why do we flip the second fraction and multiply while dividing fractions? These are items that I have to reevaluate in order to ensure that my students, and me, know why they are solving a problem the way that they are. I do not want to teach students just to plug numbers into a formula without understanding how the formula was derived. I am developing a much deeper understanding for geometry and fractions and I hope to be able to pass my knowledge on to my future students through this new method of math teaching.