Teaching Math

Teaching math can be a difficult thing to do, and practice is much needed. Everybody will teach math their own way. Some will teach it how they were once thought. Others will find their own way of teaching. Whatever teaching method you decide to use, you have to first make sure it works and is affected. Then make sure it is a way that the students can relate to it. Lastly, that they enjoy doing math and do not see it has being a horrible thing, as I myself once have. This is just how I would create my lesson plan, and like I said every teacher does it differently with their own way. Some ways are more effective than others. If you see that your students are not catching on and maybe failing, it may be time to start something new. On the other hand, if there style of teaching is successful and there students are passing with a good idea about everything, and then stay to that way of teaching. I really have not thought of how I will teach until now. I happen to remember the way my second grade teacher thought math. We would have group time and individual time. In group time we would listen to her explain what she is doing, where most of the time she was drawing something on the board. Then she would have students come up and help her finish the problem that were all in picture form. I myself can see things better by pictures, so I think it will be the best way for me to teach. Many others learn by pictures, and for those who do not that is where you explain yourself fully, and then the individual time sets in. On a worksheet would be exactly what she just thought us, but now we have to see if we can do it on our own. We were able to ask any questions, because there is nothing I hate more than a teacher that will not explain a problem to you if it is not making sense. I would encourage my students to ask as many questions as they need to, because in real life, questions need to be asked in order for there to be answers. For those teachers who will not answer questions on a quiz, test, or even just class work is only hurting the students. That will only stress them out and not want to be there. Once I am a teacher, I will always want all my students to feel comfortable in the classroom, and be able to talk to me whenever they feel is necessary. I want to be a teacher that has a close bond to their students and see me as someone they look up to and have respect for. I am a strong believer that if you give respect, respect will be returned. That does not mean that if a student is not respectful, that I am not going to nice. There will always be students that will be in your class that come from a bad home, and sometimes do not know better; because that is the type of environment they are around. All your students will be different in the way that they learn and act. That is something that as a teacher, you have to adapt to.

Math Playground

I read about this elementary school in Northern California where they are taking math to a whole different level. They built a playground that is all about math. For example, they have doors with math problems where you touch the correct answer. They will only open if it is right, but stay closed if you get it wrong. On another part of the playground, they have blocks that you can turn that look like the old Wheel Of Fortune where Vanna White would have to turn the letters. It is the same idea but with math. They have a swing set decorated in math equations. There slides are also decorated in math equations but the smaller slide is not as challenging. For example there is a problem like 1+2 and down at the bottom of the slide it says the answer which is 3. For the medium size slide, there is the problem 6-4, and at the bottom is says 2. The larger slide has a problem like 4x2, and at the bottom is says 8. They also have monkey bars that are shaped into numbers. The marry go round is also all decked out in math equations. I think this is such a good idea because the kids are playing and while they are playing, they are also learning. They made recess like one big math class, but made it fun and probably one of the smartest ideas to do for the students, while they are having a good time with there classmates. The teachers said that you hear the students shouting out math problems while they are running around. This is most likely the only school where you would hear a thing like that. More and more schools should be planning ideas such as this one to keep the students minds going while they are having a good time. They then may associate math and having fun being put together as one. As a child growing up, I remember recess as the time where you do not have to learn and have teachers around. It was your free time to run around and talk and play, however learning was never on my mind. These students are learning and they do not even know it. Once they were done with recess and back in the classroom, the teachers would hear the students talk among themselves about if they got the math problems right on the playground. Once I am a teacher, I would love to hear my students talk about different math problems to there friends because they had fun. I believe that the playground in Northern California is a success!

Technology in Math Classrooms

There are many different ideas as to how technology should be used in the math classrooms today. Some believe that students will not learn as much if they use technology such as computers and calculators, and there are still others that believe technology can benefit students if used in the proper way. We all know as future teachers and current students ourselves, that we must understand the applications and why we do them to really understand mathematics. In other words, we cannot just memorize the steps of application and plug it into our calculator, but rather we must understand why the steps were done and what our results mean. After the students have shown that they understand the material and applications, the teacher may allow the students to use the calculator once the applications have become tedious for the students. For example, if we asked a group of Calculus students to find the maximum of a line, we would not expect them to graph the function by hand and try to guess where the point is, we would instead promote them to use their calculators to find the best estimate of the point. So, even in cases such as this, technology can be used to further demonstrate the reasoning behind a problem. It may be the case that we want our students to work on the application, and then again it may be the case that we want our students to be able to see what they are doing the application for. The only thing we really have to be careful of is not to let technology replace the “basic understandings and intuitions”. Technology has the ability to make mathematical problems more worthwhile for our students. What I mean is that students can use the Internet to find data on issues that are important to them. In this way, the students are learning how to read data bases and understand what the numbers mean. After finding this data, the students could then put it into a spreadsheet on Microsoft Excel where they could manipulate the numbers, and even come up with new conclusions. Students could figure out averages and basically anything they could think of based on the information that was given in the original data. In making a spreadsheet, not only would the students become familiar with Microsoft Excel, but also they would be figuring out how to manipulate numbers and come up with equations. Another option that a teacher would have with the data the students collected would be to have them make graphs. Now depending on the class, and what the students had already learned the teacher could have the students do a number of things. In a class where students were learning to graph lines based on points, the teacher could have the students hand graph the data and maybe even come up rates, maximums, minimums, and averages by simply looking at the graph. For students who are more advanced than this, you could have the students graph the function using their calculator, or some computer program, and have them reach the same objectives as above through more accurate mathematical applications. In these examples, the technology makes the work interesting and fun, while also making the students examine and contemplate mathematical ideas among themselves.

Math Games

When I was growing up I do not remember ever playing with a toy that had to deal with math. The only learning game I can recall is where you put the different shapes into the correct hole that matches that shape. Today there are so many different learning games that teach children basic math skills. For example the Leap Frog. I always see little children playing with it. I have seen somewhere it is an actual stuffed animal frog that talks to you, and also ones that are like a mini computer. I think that it was a brilliant idea for whoever thought of it. It is not only entertaining children, but teaching them as well. My younger brother who is now 14 years old used to have a leap frog computer that he loved. His favorite section was the math part and today he is better at math then I will ever be. I am not saying that it made him ten times smarter, but I am sure that it helped him at a younger age. Today my brother still plays math games on the computer and competes with his friends. I also have a cousin who is 2 years old and has the stuffed animal frog who talks. He loves his "froggie" as he would say and repeats everything he says. He goes around the house saying "2+2=4 Yahhhh Good Job." This is a good thing because he will always have it in his head that 2+2=4. Today companies are making more and more toys that have math and all types of learning skills.  This will hopefully improve students in the future with all test scores and just being able to memorize math equations like I myself am not able to do so well. However I believe that is because I lived in Florida until I was 8 years old, which made me in second grade. I did not learn any math skills until I moved to New York where all the other students were able to multiply and divide, where I was just learning how to add and subtract. This was a huge disadvantage for me and some how I had to catch up. Because I was so behind, they ended up putting me in "special ed." in which I was only in there for 3 months. I caught on to things pretty quick. My favorite thing we would do in class was the Mad Minute quiz with adding and subtracting. I was always the first student done and they realized that I should be in the regular class now. What upsets me is that this could be happening to other students as well who move to a different state. It is known that Southern schools are a little slower than others and it should not be that way. There needs to be a change in this for not only students who move, but for students who are being taught at a later and slower rate.

TV Shows With Math

When I was in the eleventh grade, every day for a week my teacher had us watch a TV show called Numb3ers. It is a show where they have to solve real life problems and crimes with math. Unfortunately I did not care for the show and thought it was somewhat boring, but I do know people who are a fan. Since we started watching it in class, one of my friends who is not a big fan of math still enjoys the show. She said that it is making her like math in a sense. As for me on the other hand that is not going to happen. The show Numb3rs begins each week with:

We all use math every day;
to predict weather, to tell time, to handle money.
Math is more than formulas or equations;
it's logic, its rationality,
it's using your mind to solve the biggest mysteries we know.

There are also kid shows that have  math in them. For example on Disney channel Kim Possible. At school, Kim and Ron have to write a report about their hero. Kim is going to do her report on her dad but, Ron does not know who to do his report on. He decides to do it on Hego, but Ron’s dad wants Ron to do it on him. Meanwhile Kim, Ron, and Hego are dealing with a new math villain, the Mathter. The Mathter zaps Ron with a beam so that whatever he touches explodes, so to prevent from exploding he wears a gigantic bubble. When on their way to stop the Mathter and turn Ron back to normal, Ron's dad comes along to help. Ron's dad stops the Mathter and they turn Ron back to normal. Ron gets an A+ on his report. 

Another TV show for kids that helps with math is Sesame Street. This season of Sesame Street, they added a few new things to its usual mix of song, dance and educational lessons.

In its 42nd season, the preschool educational series is tackling math, science, technology and engineering. All problem areas for America's students in hopes of helping kids measure up.

Carol Lynn Parente, the show's executive producer, said that 2-year-olds were more than ready for engineering experiments. According to the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment, among 65 industrialized nations, 15 year olds in the United States placed 30th in math.

For 30 years, researchers have studied what has been coined the "Sesame effect," in which they found that exposure to the program as a preschooler equaled higher achievement in high school.

Frequent viewers even earned better grades in English, math and science and had a higher grade point average than non viewers.As I child I never even once watched Sesame Street for some reason. I guess my Mom just never put it on for me. Today, I wish I would have watched it because of how good of a show it is for children and the out come it can bring when it comes to school. I watched a video with Elmo showing flash cards with math problems and how effective it was. He really broke it down and explained what he was teaching you. One day when I have children, I will have them watch Sesame Street so they can learn math at an early age and hopefully like math and be good at it!

Mathophobia

How I know that I a mathophobe is by waited until the very end to take any math class. I wanted to put it to off for as long as I could and when they said okay it is time for that math class, I said Oh Boy... I guess if i have to. Another reason I know I am a mathophobe is because on the first day of class we took a quiz called "Are You a mathophobe?" It had several different questions like the first one was my first. It said "when I said you would be taking a math quiz now, you: A. took a deep breath and will just do the best you can. B. tenses up- math is a 4 letter word but you'll try C. panic- you know you won't get anything right. When I heard the word test or quiz I get so nervous because I am afraid that I will not know the material and get a bad grade. I have always tried very hard in school, but when it comes to math, I just do not like it. I feel like if I was better at it then maybe I may like it. However, I am not good at it so that is the main reason why I am not a fan. Even though I do not like math very much, once I am a teacher I do not want to be one of those teachers who change your whole outlook on a subject just because they have a bad attitude towards it. I have had teachers who focus on other subjects, trying to avoid math. As students we did the same thing because we learn what we see. If we see our teacher not liking math then why should we. Your elementary years are where mathophobe can begin. That is where it started for me. I had a great kindergarten and first grade teacher, after that it went downhill. Their teaching was not fun and they made math boring and not “cool”. There was a point where only the smart kids were good at math, and everyone else was just normal. Today I am such a mathophobe because I want to teach first or second grade and not go any higher because then the math is becoming too much. Not saying that it is hard in elementary school, but just the thought of it makes me unhappy. My current job right now, I work at a jewelry store where math is done at every sale. Whatever the price is we always have to take a certain percentage off depending on the piece. My boss is always getting mad at me because I always have to use a calculator and take too long to figure it out. He jokes and says did you always do bad in math during school, and I respond saying YES it was one of my worst subjects because I do not like it and I still am not good and therefore still do not like it. Hopefully one day that will change, but before it does I think I have to get good at it first!