Module 1-Teaching Practices
In the classroom for the past week and a half, I have made it a regular occurrence to ask students the hard questions in mathematics when they provide me an answer to a problem or a step towards a solution and that question is "Why?"
Commonly in mathematics, many of us forget about the question or problem being asked and just focus on the numerical value. I constantly ask my students why because I not only want them to take the correct steps, but want them to understand why they need to those steps. I ask my students to think about their answer in the context of the problem so I am always telling my students to check their answer and tell me if their answer makes sense. For instance, one problem was asking for students to find the weight of the heaviest fish caught in a fishing tournament given the weights of the four other top fish and the average weight of the top 5 fish. I asked my student after we got our answer if it was reasonable and they were unsure how to answer that question at first. I rephrased the question to them and asked, what is the minimum weight that the heaviest fish could weigh? This registered with them and they all said at the minimum it would have had to be .1 lb heavier than the number two fish because the weights of the fish were taken to one decimal place. Then I explained that this is what I meant by my question of a reasonable answer.
By getting my students to think about the importance of the problem and what their answer means, I can work to get my students to visualize multiple ways to solve the problem and work on reading word problems in a fashion that will allow them to create equations to solve word problems accurately and fast.
It is very rewarding to see your growth as a teacher. While it is frustrating, tiring, hard, and time consuming, it is the best job in the world - next to being a parent - in our opinion! Now that you have made these phone calls and sent these emails, consider doing it again and let the parents know that it is working and you are seeing success. It will go along way with the parents and students. Nice job mixing up your presentation ppts. Also, while step-by-step instructions seem to be working now, teach the students how to start investigating a problem and know that we are seeing students coming to us with better self confidence to attempt problems now that the common core implementation has a few years of growth in the elementary and middle schools. Students are coming with better conceptual understanding and questioning. Thanks for sharing this week!
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