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.