Interdisciplinary studies centered around mathematics

As someone who has grown up having a very strong passion for many different subjects in school and having many different hobbies and interests outside of the classroom, I understand the importance of branching out into other fields of study.  My interests include but are not limited to mathematics (obviously), most sciences, history and social sciences, analytical writing, visual arts, and performing arts, such as band and theater.  Don't get me wrong, I was no valedictorian or prodigy who could do almost anything with great ease, but I always felt as though my strengths were very diverse.  At that time, and honestly only until just recently, I had always wanted my strengths to be less diverse and more singular.  In other words, I would rather have been very strong at one discipline rather than average/mediocre at many.  Though at the time this idea sounded logical, nowadays, I couldn't feel more different.  The reason is that now I realize how much each study relates to and relies on one another.

This past fall and winter I had the amazing opportunity to work for the Brookings High School marching band and winter drum-line as their front-line instructor.  I had been a front-line instructor previously at my old high school, which was an amazing teaching opportunity and allowed me to grow as an educator.  When I was teaching drum-line at my old high school, I was still teaching with the perspective of isolation among certain subjects, especially between math and music.  It wasn't until I began working at Brookings High School that I started to realize how much of my teaching was influenced by mathematics. Once I realized this, I began to experiment with the idea of merging these two disciplines in my teaching.  One of the earliest attempts was my use of functions to explain the growth and decay and the shaping of dynamics in a specific phrase.  I also used trig to explain wrist rotations and angles of mallet heights off the keyboard in order to define specific dynamics and stroke types.  I also used the concept of basic machinery to explain motor movements and the math and physics of velocity and distance behind these movements.  It was also crucial to have an understanding of anatomy of our bodies in order to maximize on energy efficiency and technical development.  All of us staff members also used many different analogies and emotional connections to express the show concept to the students and to get them to perform with a certain style of movement and emotional display.

I could honestly go on and on about the different disciplines used in teaching for front-ensemble, but I think you get the picture.  The important thing to take away is not how many different disciplines can be applied to music, but instead how relatable and intertwined each different discipline can be.  In order to maximize on the learning of individual studies, all it takes is a little imagination and the knowledge of multiple perspectives of learning.  Though I'll admit, most of my experience with interdisciplinary teaching centers mainly around music, I feel very strongly that just being able to harness the power to pull concepts and perspectives from all subjects is immensely crucial in teaching any content area.

Recall and the reasoning behind Problems of the Day

Throughout the time I’ve been in the education system, especially high school, there have been many classes in which we “warmed-up” before our class lecture or activities began. In elementary school, this idea was usually limited to vocal music, band, and physical education, or a class at the beginning of the day. All of these were quite valid classes to warm-up for. Once I got to middle school, there was one more class that added to this idea, and I’m starting to realize why.

Once I got to middle school, both math teachers started each and every class period with a set of problems on the board, called our “Problems of the Day,” or POD for short. These problems were usually recall from previous sections or even previous courses we had taken. The POD’s became a staple in their classrooms until I graduated, as I had both teachers for all of my math classes. At the the time, my student mind viewed these problems as tedious and pointless, as it just took time out of our time to lecture and learn new material. However, once I got to college and started taking some of the higher level math courses, I began to understand why the POD’s are quite effective.

It’s not secret in today’s world that there are many students that despise mathematics classes, and it isn’t hard to understand why. Math requires a different type of thinking than most courses. The non-math courses I’ve taken in the past required a lot of memorization and understanding how things work, while the math courses I’ve taken require understanding of concepts with a little memorization, such a trig identities. However, where math differs from these other courses is that math requires us to piece together what little we can memorize and solve equations using a series of steps. It is a very different way of thinking than other subjects, which brings me back to our POD’s.

Many students don’t like math because it is a different way of thinking. This idea changed my thought on why our POD’s in middle and high school were so important. It can be a tough transition from the thought processes of different courses. Think about the schedule of a high school student: They begin the day in a Biology class, then move on to English, then study hall, then off to choir, then lunch, then PE, then math, and end the day in shop class. Each of these courses and time slots have a different way of thinking, which can be tough to get in the right state of mind for lecture.

I now understand that idea of our POD’s were to get our brain in “math mode” or in a mathematical way of thinking. Having a 50 minute lecture is pointless when the students aren’t in math mode until 15 minutes into class. At that point, a third of the class has gone by and students may have missed an important part of the topic. This doesn’t bode well if the class doesn’t comprehend about a third of the class over the course of the year. Using information recalled from previous chapters is especially important in this as well, as it would likely tie into the content you are currently covering. Using this idea will help students get into the right state of mind when beginning class.

I may not have enjoyed them in middle and high school, but I now understand the importance of POD’s and how they can impact the effectiveness of the lessons we give and how the class interprets the content as a whole. I would personally like to integrate POD’s into my classroom when it is all said and done, which I something I never thought I would have said about seven or eight years ago.

Are You Not Entertained?

From the teachers that brought you, "Stand in front and lecture," and "Here's the answer now figure it out," comes "Everyone quiet whilst you work, I don't wanna hear any talking." Starring Generic Math Teacher, and a special guest by the Social Studies Department.

One of the largest perceived problems of math classes in high school, and, frankly, in college is that the lecture lifestyle is the life for the common teacher or professor. The variability in day to day teaching life is somewhat limited and the lifestyle becomes a staple in the everyday life of both students and teachers. Most movies purvey math classes as boring, and there's a large social stigma behind math because of the fact that it doesn't hold the interest in people who don't receive structure well. 

Something that I love to emphasize is a combination of fun activities, gamification, and lecture-style teaching in a course to help progress the students not just by them learning the subject, but also by piquing their interest in math. The coolest concepts in math can hold such significance. I specifically remember the day one of our math teachers came in to teach us imaginary numbers. She started in regular lecture style, then left, and returned with a tutu, a crown, and a magic wand, and graced us with imaginations large enough to comprehend imaginary numbers.

Whereas the structure behind lecture-style teaching correlates with the structured students, the theatre kids are left in the dust on occasion as their imagination isn't suited for the rigorous structure and boredom of everyday math lecturing. Therefore, the emphasis here is to not forget lecture-style teaching but to entertain the ideas of different activities to keep the students wanting more math rather than less of it.

Gaining Students Attention Back if off Track!

Everyone knows there is a difference between Elementary Education (K-5/6) and Secondary Education (5/6-12). They are different in many different ways including content, what the school day consists of, and how to gain back the students attention if off track. Today I will be talking about the different type of strategies used to gain the students attention back if starting to get off track. 

Starting with Elementary Education, which consists of Kindergarden-5^th/6^thgrade. The different types of strategies that I have experienced/seen are as follows: 

·     Repeat the clap rhythm 

·     Saying then answering 

·     Announcing that he/she will wait for the class 

            I’m guessing we all know what the repeating the clap rhythm strategy is from either our days in Elementary or from us seeing younger classrooms. For this strategy, the teacher comes up with a clap rhythm and the students then repeat the rhythm back to the teacher. This is effective after a couple second after the claps are done. Sometimes it takes a couple rhythms for them to understand what is needed to happen or they like to talk/laugh about the rhythms and continue to clap them. 

            The saying then answering strategy has to be implemented at the beginning of the year so the students understand what it is used for. For example, the teacher says, “Class, Class” and the whole class replies with “Yes, Yes”. This strategy is effective immediately because the students know once they reply with “Yes, Yes”, or whatever saying you want to use as a teacher, that you want their undivided attention and for them to turn on their learning ears. When said once, doesn’t have to be said again until they start doing something different and explanation is need to be given to the students. 

            Announcing that he/she will wait for the class is another strategy used for the younger group of children. If the students are not listening and talking while the teacher is explaining something he/she will just announce, “I will wait”, maybe repeat themselves a couple times, then sit without talking for the students to understand what he/she wants. This again is effective after a couple of seconds because the younger students may not understand right away that they need to stop talking immediately. 

Next is Secondary Education, which involves 5^th/6^thgrade through High School. The different types of strategies that I have experienced/seen are as follows:

·     Silence till student’s listen 

·     Talks at the class as a whole 

·     Singles out a specific group of students 

·     Singles out a student 

            The silence till student’s listen strategy is when the teacher just stops talking till the students start to listen and pay attention to what he/she is trying to teach them. This strategy is affective after a while because not all students notice that you’re not talking right away but after a while if everyone goes silent then they will notice. Doesn’t really solve the problem right away and may have to occur a couple times if the group of kids don’t get the point that is trying to be said by this strategy. 

            Talk at the class as a whole is a strategy that involves telling the whole class, “Class pay attention please”, “Everyone please listen this is important”, ect. Not as affective since its needed to be repeated a couple times right away and then a little later will have to be repeated again to get them to understand. Can be affective for certain classes depending on the students. 

            The singling out a specific group of students and singling out a student individually are both pretty much the same. This type of strategy has the teacher single out a group or an individual in front of the whole class. It’s an effective strategy that gets them to be quiet right away but not a good strategy in the long run. In reality, it just embarrasses them to the whole class to the point where they stop talking.

As shown above, the types of strategies used to get the students attention in the two different age categories are significantly different in their own ways. Personally, there are some strategies I agree with and others I don’t. Each teacher will have their own personal way they like and find effective for the students to come back to learning if starting to get off track. As teachers, we just need to find the strategies that work for each class since each and every class will be different from one another! 

How do you want to help

Through some of my classes I've noticed that some of the teachers wont give help just answers. And while the answer is nice to have just giving it and nothing else doesn't help with trying to understand the material. I haven't experienced this in any of my math classes but in the ones that I have the teachers are confused that the test don't go as while as they planned.

And on the other end of the spectrum their are the teachers that move so fast through the material expecting the students to understand right away because that teacher understands it already.

So what I'm saying is as a teacher you need to find a middle ground for explaining your material. But that middle ground is going to change from student to student, because in some cases if you give the answer the students might be able to see where they went wrong and some of them might be able to understand it with a quick explanation.

The importance of Notation

I want to talk about something that I have seen in my classroom observations, notation. I have seen a few teachers who put little to no emphasis on proper notation. I've even seen a teacher evaluating an expression without using any equal signs! So, the question should be if we actually do need to stress the importance of notation. I think that the answer to this question should obviously be yes.

There are a lot of different reasons that we should emphasis the importance of notation while teaching math. First off, it makes learning a whole lot easier. When I observed the teacher who hadn't used notation, I was genuinely confused as to what the goal of the lesson was. I would consider myself very strong in mathematics, and I think that there might be something wrong if I don't understand what is going on. 

There is also the issue of your students wasting their time doing a lot of work that means nothing if it has bad notation. Bad notation can lead to total misunderstanding, so students will put in a lot of effort and not have any of it make sense to someone else.

We should also talk about the benefits of teaching your students good notation. With good notation, students will be able to make work that makes sense to their classmates, teachers, and the rest of the world. Good notation will help students understand more complex topics and it will also help them understand the math when they attempt to prove something. 

Do You Want to Teach Like a Pirate?

       One of the biggest questions I have asked and hear a lot is how to improve student’s engagement. Even for longtime teachers, it can be something they want to improve. Thinking back on my own experiences when was I most engaged? I think several of these very engaging classes can be found with the teachers that still make me want to come back after all these years. Some of the best memories from school were from teachers that may have taught like a pirate. From my Latin teacher reenacting Pompeii with a miniature city and pop volcano to my English teacher that made us act out Romeo and Juliet. Both were able to bring the lesson to life and we took a stronger hold to it because of it. Here I am going to take a bit about the book Teach Like a Pirate and what you can do to be an engaging pirate teacher.

       In Teach Like a Pirate, Dave Burgess talks about teaching in three circles. The first is content, this is what you as the teacher know and what you bring to the students to learn--you must have it. The second is methods and techniques, these are the tools or ways you use to bring the content to your students--these are essential as well. The third circle is presentation, this is the way you present your content and methods so that students are drawn in. I agree with Dave that often the third circle is not brought up as much as the first two.

       There are two big questions Dave proposes when you want to see if you are teaching like a pirate “if students didn’t have to be there, would you be teaching an empty room?” and “Do you have any lessons that are so amazing you can sell tickets for them? Would students willingly pay to be in your classroom”? If you can say yes to either of these, you may already be a bit of a pirate. Sometimes putting on a bit of a show is what you need to get engagement out of students. This does not mean you should only entertain them. Use this pirate method as a pathway for engagement as you see fit.

       How do you start teaching like a pirate? The book talks a lot about this but here are some traits you should encourage in yourself. 

Passion, remember what brought you into your content and teaching. You are not teaching lessons, you are teaching students. Bring your passion and students into your lesson planning. 

Immersion, let yourself go when teaching. This is not to say to forget what you planned for a lesson but be free to explore the topic with students, and to submerge into a presentation, showing the passion you have. 

Rapport, build the relationship you have with your students and learn about them. Learn their names, what they think about themselves, and include what they like as much into your lessons as you can. For this, I would recommend starting strong on the first day by using the class time to learn about your students. 

Ask and Analyze, make sure to ask questions and encourage your students to question as well. One rule Dave includes in his classrooms is that it is a no meanness zone, he wants everyone to feel comfortable asking questions and speaking up. 

Transform, change up your classroom and keep things new in how you teach. Keep students wanting to come to class to see what’s going to happen tomorrow. Can you have class outside or in the hallway, do you what the work you do in class to always be worksheets, what can you do to make things interesting. 

Enthusiasm, bring your passion and light the fires of your students. This sounds close to passion, but I feel enthusiasm is more contagious. The more energy you show towards your lesson the more students will be open to be a part of it. 

These traits together will help you become a P.I.R.A.T.E teacher.

       There are many ways of teaching and not all teachers teach like a pirate. But adding on to the circle of presentation can help any teacher. When I watched and read about how teachers have started teaching like a pirate it reminded me of the Chasing Einstein presentation. Mainly because it changed how the material was presented to students. So, gamification  can one of your “hooks” you use as a pirate. Don’t feel like you can’t do this--every teacher has it in them to be creative and make a pirate lesson. If you are having a hard time thinking of pirate lessons: start with one of your own, look online at what other teachers have done, and take inspiration from everything. I would like to also talk about how often you need to do this. Which is as often as you like. Dave recommends at least making the first day unforgettable and then trying to make one lesson out of a chapter/unit “the big show”. So don’t feel overwhelmed and try to do a big pirate lesson every day. I’d say start with some ideas for introducing a new topic that’ll hook them in. See how it goes, then make notes on what worked and didn’t work. Don’t be afraid of looking silly, sometimes that’s what you may want. Keep it professional but don’t let that hold you back from making an engaging lesson. I know the content, I’ve got a growing number of tool/methods to bring to students, and I think teaching like a pirate could lead to many ways of connecting it all to students

       I think another big part of this post is: don’t be afraid of reading weird sounding books or articles. When I first heard about Teach Like a Pirate by Dave Burgess, I thought it was a gimmick book but now I feel it has something for everyone. The worst that can happen is you won't like it and even then you still got some reading in. Teach like a Pirate is an easy read and If you want to learn more about this you can pick up Dave’s book or follow him on twitter @burgessDave. He also recommends a lot of other books I am interested in picking up there as well.

Skylar Halverson

Flipping Out About Flipped Classrooms

As a freshman, I attended the South Dakota CTM Conference in Huron; at the very end of the last day, I attended a session by Sheila McQuade, a teacher at O’Gorman High School in Sioux Falls, in which she described her experience of flipping a classroom. 

While each teacher has their own style, in general, a flipped classroom combines teacher-created videos and interactive lessons with help on homework during the hour of class time. Students’ homework is to watch the assigned video lecture and take notes; when they come to class the next day, they are to work on assigned problems, worksheets, etc. and ask any questions that may arise.

Sheila had a presentation prepared about the ups and downs of flipping her classroom. She went through the process of creating the videos, pointing out which software and programs worked best for her. She found that her biggest obstacle was keeping up with making all of the videos for her students to watch and take notes on. The biggest thing that I took away from her presentation was that flipping a classroom takes a LOT of preparation; not only do you make lesson plans, but you have to get the materials necessary to make and edit the videos, and then actually make them (and then maybe remake them if they don't turn out as you expected). 

She advised against flipping a class that you're teaching for the first time; if you made a video lecture without having taught the lesson, it would be hard to anticipate students’ questions and spots of confusion. So, when you’re comfortable with a lesson and how to teach the concepts in it, then you can consider creating a video lesson. She also recommended not flipping an entire year's worth of lessons at once, but rather doing it unit by unit. This allows you to make sure students are comfortable and familiar with material they are learning through video lectures. 

Once the videos are made and available to students, it is important to have students take notes and follow along with any problems worked out in the video. Sheila said that she would check students’ notes and ask if they had any clarifying questions before the start of class, and I thought this was a good way to connect what they learned in the videos to whatever medium of classwork was given to them that day.

 A benefit that Sheila mentioned was that videos allow students to go at their own pace. So, while a video may be 10 to 15 minutes long, a student may need to rewind and re-watch a certain step to the problem in order to fully understand it. This is a huge advantage for flipped classrooms; they allow various kinds and shapes of learners to follow along and understand in a way that better fits them.

After attending this session, I was so intrigued by this idea of flipping a lesson. It is most definitely something I can see myself, as a learner, enjoying, and so I know that I’d like to try it within my first couple years of teaching, even if it’s just one lesson at a time.

A Focus on Learning

Suppose you ask a question to a classroom full of math students. Two students raise their hand. One is a little black boy, the other a little white girl. Which one do you call on? If you call on the boy, you may be accused of discrimination for not allowing the minorities to have their voice. If you call on the girl, you may be accused of being sexist, not allowing women to have their voice. Now say you choose the girl, and she gets the answer wrong. Students could then use that to support the false idea that woman cannot do math. The same is true for the boy; if he gets the answer wrong, one could use that as evidence to support the false idea that minorities are stupid and cannot do math.

Now suppose you ask a question to a classroom full of students. Two students raise their hand. Now which one do you choose to answer the question? By stripping the question of all the racial and gender information, one can think about alternative factors. Which student is more likely to have the correct answer? Which student offers to answer more questions? Which student is more eager to answer it?

Now it doesn’t matter what race, creed, sex, religion, ethnicity, nation of origin, sexuality, age or any other factor that does not affect intelligence the student identifies with. All that matters is learning, and whatever factors go along with that. It is important to be aware of these differences, but by obsessing over them and telling everyone not to notice [insert long list of differences here], people automatically start to look for the differences then tell themselves not to see them. Why don’t we focus on learning how to teach, rather than focusing on all the differences our students have? This will lead to a greater America.

Confidence In Math

Today I want to write about a certain student that we are all very familiar with. As future math teachers, we all know of the student who is convinced that they do not have the “math gene”. By this I mean, the student that thinks that they are incapable of learning and doing math. As a tutor, have been working with a student who literally believes that he will not pass his math class because he was not capable of learning the material. For his privacy, in this post I am going to call him John. I tutored John in college algebra last semester, and now I have him again this semester. Last semester, John barely showed up to his tutoring sessions, and when I asked him why he wasn’t showing up he told me that it was because he thought it was pointless and that he wasn’t going to learn it anyways so there was no point getting extra help. Personally, I think that the reason he was doing so poorly was because he wasn’t letting himself learn. John had one last session last semester right before the final. He met with me after missing several of his sessions. I was trying to teach him something that his calculator can do that will help him on the final. He then admitted to me that he did not have a calculator and hasn’t had one all semester. I realized, from the second he started the class he truly believed that he wasn’t going to pass the class. So of course, he didn’t. He did not want to learn. So, he decided he was incapable, because to him it was easier to believe that it wasn’t in his control than to put in the work to learn it.

This semester John is a completely new student. The first day of tutoring he walked in (with a calculator!) and he said, “I should have come to more of these last semester”. Since then he has come to all but one session. He comes and works for the entire time, and he actually questions from lecture. He said he has attended almost every class and he filled out every note guide! The best part about all of this is that he really believes that he can succeed this time. He comes to tutoring and is INSANELY more confident.

Something similar to this happened to me while I was in middle and high school. When I was younger, about fifth grade, I did not do any of the testing that the “smart” students did to be in the smart math courses. I didn’t care or let it bother me until I was in 7^th grade into my high school years. By then I realized that I wasn’t being challenged in math. So, in hopes of joining a math class that was more challenging to me my mom called and asked the school if I could move up, because they weren’t allowing 8^th graders to skip classes. Therefore, when I was in high school, I did not really feel like I was treated as if I was smart in high school. Even though I got A’s in all my math classes, my class was always getting compared to the accelerated students, thus we were always treated as if we weren’t as capable at math.

The reason I wanted to write about this is because this something I really want to focus on when I am a teacher. I want to make sure I treat every student as if they are capable of learning math. I believe that a student is capable of doing math as long as they believe that they are capable of learning math. I think that it is extremely important for all of us to remember as teachers.

Maintaining Professionalism in Your Profession

              When I was a kid, my mom would do this thing where she’d pick out a random person in the mall or airport and then tell me his/her life story. At first, I was quite amazed. I would think, is my mom psychic? Eventually I grew up, and I realized she was just joking and making up some elaborate story. Despite her stories not being real, I learned to watch people and see if I could learn anything about them by noticing small things.

              Teaching is a career in which we never stop learning. We’re constantly changing (and hopefully improving) the way we go about instruction. I have been watching teachers my whole life, but I have really focused on watching them starting my sophomore year in high school when I decided I wanted to become a math teacher.

              I went to a nice high school, and I am very privileged to have received the education I did, however, I noticed a few things that really upset me—things that I can guarantee happen in almost all high schools. These things shared one commonality: professionalism.

              I think teachers too often forget that teaching is their job. I’m not saying that they should look at teaching with disgust and have a negative attitude about it. What I mean is teachers try to be the students’ friend, and thus forget that there are boundaries that need to be put in place. Not only does this happen in the classroom, but it happens with social media.

              It would be unrealistic to expect all teachers to not have any kind of social media. After all, being a teacher means you’re a human, and humans in today’s society tend to have quite a bit of social media like Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, etc. But being a teacher in today’s society means you have to be even more careful than most people have to. One miss spoken phrase or action can land you in a lot of legal trouble along with possibly losing your job and reputation.

              That is why teacher’s need to set boundaries when it comes to social media and their students. The best thing some of my teachers did was tell us students that they would not add us on Facebook until we graduated. They didn’t mean graduated from their class—they meant from high school. Just because a student doesn’t have you for class, doesn’t mean it’s okay to have them on social media.

              Setting boundaries also allows for you as a teacher to maintain a work and private life. Keep social media to be for family and friends. There is no need to have a student as a friend on Instagram or Snapchat, let alone to post photos or videos of those students on your accounts. If you use social media for non-educational purposes, your students have no place in it.  

              Be their teacher and mentor, but remember that you are also hired to teach, not to be their friend. You can be a good teacher, even a fantastic teacher, without crossing these boundaries. This is your chosen profession, so remember to keep it professional.

When Is Technology Use in a Classroom Too Much?

We live in a society today that is predicated on technology. So it is only fitting that, in many ways, education is now reliant on technology. While I am all for the use of technology in a classroom, I think it is best used as a means to supplement teacher instruction, rather than replace it. 

Throughout my experiences growing up, I know several teachers that have based their entire lesson plan around a video or diagram they found on the Internet. But then, the impossible happens; technology stops working (for whatever reason) and it’s like we have lost our ability to breathe. I am as guilty of this as anyone else, when my phone or laptop suddenly experiences issues at the most inopportune time. However, as a teacher in a classroom, there are several ways around this dilemma. Take the information that was going to be presented in the video and/or diagram and relay it to your students based on your understanding. Or, perhaps proceed with new material and show your students the video/diagram at a later date once the technological issues are resolved. I had numerous teachers throughout high school that would halt a lesson all together when this situation would occur, because they felt limited as to the material they could cover without technology. I guess in some instances this makes sense. However, I feel that the disadvantages of too much technology in a classroom can often times outweigh the advantages, from both a teacher perspective, but even more so from a student perspective.

I think in many ways technology is helpful to aid in student learning. At the same time, I also think it can serve as a major distraction and as a hindrance to learning. For one, if a student is bored, having easy access to their own personal tablet will give them the freedom to search the Internet, play a game, or do other things that do not pertain to learning. Readily accessible technology in a school setting also makes it that much easier for students to cheat or plagiarize material. And likewise, from a teacher perspective, it is a lot harder for you to know if your students are paying attention and doing what they are told. For example, say the textbook is online and accessible from each students’ tablet. You instruct them to take 5 minutes to read a section of a certain chapter. Unless you walk around the room and look at each students’ individual tablet, there is no way for you to know what they are actually doing. And even then, students could see you walking towards them, pull up the textbook, and once you are out of their sight, go back to what they were previously doing. With good old fashioned textbooks, it was a lot easier to monitor your students.

But one thing that is very alarming, as a future math teacher, is how this easy access to technology can effect students’ problem solving skills and critical thinking. There are many great websites out there that help promote learning and problem solving by providing answers to various problems. I am certainly not against this, as again, I am as guilty as anyone for using these websites. We browsed through these various websites together a few weeks back in MATH 371. However, these websites should be used as a means to check answers and understanding, as opposed to relying on them for doing all the work to save time and headaches. When some students have trouble adding 464+332 or solving an equation such as 3x+7+16, I believe it speaks to how dependent we are on technology... that students can be so lazy that they will not even make the time to solve these simple, straightforward problems using their own knowledge and critical thinking.

Please don’t get me wrong; I think technology in a classroom for both students and teachers is beneficial, when appropriately used. But we as teachers are paid to do just that, teach; not to rely on technology to do it for us. Likewise, students need to develop the necessary problem solving, critical thinking, and social skills that I feel best come from an old fashioned school setting. Again, maybe I am old-school (no pun intended), but I often ponder, as a soon to be full time teacher, when is technology use in a classroom beneficial, and when is it simply too much?

Andrew Breitzman

The Importance of Workshops and Conferences

As a teacher or pre-service teacher, it can be very beneficial to attend various workshops, seminars, and/or conferences. Back in high school, I did not understand why all my teachers would miss a day or two of school to attend a conference. Some of them wanted to while others were upset about it because they were forced to attend. So, I kind of got the idea in my head that workshops were annoying or were somewhat a waste of time especially if you already knew how to teach the material to your students. My perspective has completely changed after being in the program here at SDSU.

In October of 2018, I attended the NCTM Regional Conference in Kansas City. Not only did I attend seminars focused on how to incorporate better teaching methods into the classroom, but I also attended workshops focused on technology resources for teachers. These technology resources were aimed at aiding and furthering instruction in the classroom. These sessions really opened my eyes to what I as a teacher could incorporate into my classroom for not only me, but for my students.

In these technology sessions I was introduced to many different math websites and apps like Desmos, Quizlet, Quizzes, etc. I was also able to get an in-depth look at how some of them operated and how I could possibly implement them in my own classroom. I really felt like I started to understand the beneficial use of using these websites and apps in the classroom by attending these sessions.

The extent to which a teacher chooses to use technology is up to his/her own opinion, however, sessions like these that show the many uses of technology and how beneficial they can be to a classroom, may lead others to question why a teacher refuses to use technology in his/her classroom. Technology is all around us, and as educators we need to learn to adapt and find ways to incorporate parts of the outside world into our classrooms.

While we may be teachers, we never stop learning. Just because we are really good at math, doesn’t mean we have learned it all. It is important to embrace these education experiences especially as you grow more experienced in your teaching career. If you want to be the best teacher out there, you’ll have to put in some effort. Be that teacher that is happy to attend a workshop or conference because you are excited to bring back something new to your students. Embrace the learning because it is what you will be doing for the rest of your life.

Kaylee Johnson