Weekly Report and Reflection Week #4

Hello again blogger friends, today I would like to continue our conversation on education and mathematics. I'm sure that everybody reading this post have studied some form of mathematics at one point or another in their lifetime. Due to this, I'm sure everyone has experienced first hand that different people learn mathematics differently. This is not an abnormality, and in my opinion is almost better than if everyone learned the same way. The important thing is that everyone is able to understand the concept and solve the problems given to them. Having different methods to solve a single problem opens opportunities for deeper understandings.

Applying this idea into an educational setting, we cannot force everybody to learn in the same manner. The problem isn't that different people learn in different ways, but how do we teach many people who learn in different ways? This method is called differentiated learning, and is not a new concept to education.

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 Differentiated learning is the philosophy of providing different students different methods of learning. Some examples of different and effective teaching strategies are:

-Specialization/Generalization
-Guess and Check
-Use of visual aids (Diagrams, charts, etc.)
-Use of manipulatives
-Instrumental vs. Relational learning
-Logical Reasoning
-Working Backwards

I myself experienced how to apply differential instruction within a recent class that I attended. I was given a math problem and told to explain and solve it in more than one way. The math problem itself was that I was given a rubix cube with undefined size. How many blocks of the cube had 1 face showing from the outside, 2 faces showing from the outside, etc. It proved to be more difficult to find more than one way of solving this problem than solving the problem itself. In the end, It turned out that many of the strategies listed above could be applied to this problem. One example is that you could use guess and check as well as visual aids to make a chart describing different sizes cubes and their corresponding number of blocks with 0,1,2, or 3 faces showing. Another method is using our knowledge of cubes (how many vertices, faces, sides) to deduct formulas describing the number of blocks with 0,1,2, or 3 faces given any sized cube.

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 Applying differentiated instruction to your own classroom may seem difficult, especially considering the fact that the teacher himself/herself has a preferred method of instruction. Luckily, you are not in this alone. There are an abundance of resources available for your use, all you have to do is access them. One example of these resources, and maybe the most important resource, is your peers. No matter what situation or difficulties that you are having in your classroom. There is always somebody who has faced this difficulty before you. There is a decent chance that you will not be the only math teacher at your school, and it is not a sign of weakness to ask others for help. Discussing lesson plans, teaching methods, and behavioral strategies with other teachers can be beneficial towards your own classroom. Another resource which is easily accessible is the internet. If you are unable to find the answer you are searching for from your peers, there are many forums, blogs, and websites which exist for the use of all teachers. One example of this is http://teachers.net/ . This website contains multiple resources which aid all educators such as lesson plans, job postings, chat rooms, and forums. You can post any issue which you may have on the forum and the community will come together to brainstorm a solution for you. There are many other sites similar to this which offer important resources for educators in need.