Hello Everyone,
Well I just finished watching hours of videos and reading material on how to teach Elem. Math to young children. Who would have thought that there would be so much to teaching this stuff. I realized that knowing the information that you are teaching is only a small step in teaching it. If you are going to be a successful teacher you need to have many tools in your tool box. Every child learns in a different way and in order to reach out and teach every child you need to know many different ways of teaching the same material.
Not only do you have to do this because you care about children and you want them to get the most out of their education, but because it is the law. There are law that that say that every child must become sufficient in math and show progress every year. The way that the state knows if a teacher is doing a good job and reaching out to every child is by giving the children many tests, that in the end will show that specific child's progress over the year.
I believe that being a teacher is more than just teaching children the material that they need to know, but to teach every child the same material in a different. In a way that reaches every child so that the information stick with them throughout their year.
I liked what you said about how every child learns in a different way and in order to reach out and teach every child you need to know many different ways of teaching the same material. You are so right about this. Some students are very visual and/or tactile and will need to use pictures and manipulatives longer than those who seem to be able to jump into the written calculations much earlier. Teachers need to be prepared to accommodate different learning styles and preferences as well as differing abilities for each concept he or she is teaching. Hands on materials like tens block are a great way to teach place value, addition, and subtraction before (and even during and after) introducing the written equations that go along with them. Another example: When you look at estimating and doing mental math, there are so many directions and methods a student can take or use to figure out the same problem.
ReplyDeleteI was wondering, and maybe you were too, if children learn in so many different ways, why is it that their math proficiency is only measured with one kind of standardized test? I wonder what other kind of testing methods might be better at assessing student progress and proficiency.
Kathy- the question that you thought about the standardized math testing was very interesting. That is something that I have never thought of before. Since I work in a Elem. school and am involved with a lot of the testing that goes on I do know that there are different test that can be given to individual students. It is not easy through to get these test. There are many hopes that Special Ed. teachers have to go throw in order to get a different test for a child that may learn in a different way than others do. I also know that some of the tests that students are given start very easy then get really hard and eventually adjusted to that individual students abilities, which is very nice. Anyways, that is a very good question. One wreath looking into.
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