Hi, my name is Erlisa and I am a teacher candidate. As a teacher candidate, I have to take a variety of courses—one of them being Math. My understanding of Math was limited in Elementary and High School. As a child and teenager, I always struggled to understand what Math was and how I could apply it to the real world. My struggle lied in picturing a particular problem in my mind. So, in order to survive Math class I memorized formulas and did drills, but this did not help me understand Math. To this day, I struggle doing simple Math operations in my head such as multiplying or dividing. When speaking with students or other people my own age, everyone speaks of the same difficulties when it comes to Math. So, the problem then lies with how we have all been taught Math which is the traditional methods of just drills and tests—not actual understanding. So this blog will be dedicated to exploring different ways to teach Math and to understand Math. One of the recent videos that I saw on this topic was a TED talk by Dan Meyer (video embedded below). The way that he explained the way that Math should be taught has really opened my eyes to the possibilities of allowing students to actually think about a problem and formulate an answer on their own. Rather than simply memorizing a method and being only concerned about the right answer—the traditional method. I encourage anyone reading this post to take a few moments to watch this video below. One last note, I hope that if I do teach Math someday that my students walk out of my class feeling confident about Math and love the subject because Math does really apply to the real world. So, through this blog I will document my journey to finding resources, expanding my knowledge, acquiring learning concepts that I can adjust how traditional Math is taught.
Meyer, D. (Speaker). (2013). TEDedTalks: Math class needs a makeover [Youtube].
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