Week 4: Classroom Implications

As I mentioned in last week's blog, I see a lot of classroom connections with my externship.  As one who always enjoyed school and excelled in school, it was hard for me to understand where some of my students were coming from.  Why didn't they jump at the chance to come up to the board?  Why weren't they here everyday?  After these last few weeks in a new environment in a field that I am not an expert in, it's a little easier to understand.  While I have enjoyed my time at Civco, I know that it is not the career for me.  I have a passion for teaching, not for crunching numbers.  With that being said, most of my students are not passionate about learning, therefore it is hard for them to be at school every day.  I need to find their passion and connect it to what we are doing.  This reminds me of a student I had last year in a Geometry class.  He really did not like school.  He struggled to be there and if he was, he wasn't always mentally present.  However, he had a passion for pool and billiards.  I knew this and also knew we'd be studying angles of reflection.  I told this student about two weeks in advance that we'd be using pool as an application of angles of reflection, and I'd need his help.  He was there every day we studied angles of reflection.  Just taking a few moments and finding my student's passion made such a difference in his learning.  I need to do that for every student.

I also think that it my job to help students find their passions.  Sometimes students just go through the motions, without reflecting on what they enjoy and why.  If I give students the opportunity to do this reflection, perhaps they will discover something new about themselves.  As a math teacher, I will also try to bring in more real world examples.  I am very excited for this next year, as we purchased new textbooks.  This material is much more up-to-date, with relevant examples.  But, I won't stop there; I will search out even more examples.  I will even assign students to find these connections.  I think it would be great to gather all of these examples and put them on one central place (maybe another blog??) so students could access these connections at any time.


It is my hope that students become more passionate about their learning and more passionate about math.  Math is not an old, boring subject that they will never use.  Rather it is integral to their lives and will assist them in their futures.