As a child, I had a world of opportunity available to me. I grew up on 11 acres surrounded by 150 acres of land owned by distant family in northern Wisconsin. My dad worked as a machine operator at a drill bit factory in the nearby town, and my mom worked as a secretary at the same factory. My dad is a problem-solver. He loves to tinker with anything and figure out how to repair or build anything. Our 3 car garage plus workshop was and still is unusable as a garage because of the plethora of tools, machines, wood, and seemingly items of junk that have made their home there. Watching my dad build our entire house on his own, fixing every vehicle we ever owned, designing his own guns, taking my mom’s visions of furniture and producing an exact replica, as well as creating the machines needed to build and fix (all without any formal training) was an experience that I am now realizing is not typical. I am now 1250 miles away, and terribly frustrated when I can’t just run into the garage to find that quick fix or the tools to make my own visions.
I love to dream and to invent. Fortunately, I was not only encouraged to share my ideas, but I was provided with the tools to bring them all into reality. The Ted video of Gever Tulley brought back so many memories of my own childhood. My entire growing up was exactly like his “Tinkering School”. Because of the unlimited amounts of opportunity I had to tinker, create, and reflect on the successful (and not so successful) products, problem-solving is one of my strongest skills. I visit my family about 2 times per year, and each time I still come with projects I want to create.
It was not until watching Gever Tulley’s video that I actually reflected on my own bringing up and how that has affected the person I am today. Upon the realization that the majority of my knowledge and skills were developed as a direct result of a lifetime of tinkering, I must ask the question, how am I providing these same opportunities for my math students? Is it possible to supply similar learning experiences for them? What does that look like in the classroom, and how do I make that happen? In the math world, this type of learning is called “discovery learning”, “problem-based learning”, “standards learning”, and “constructivist learning”.
Teachers who design lessons to foster discovery learning find that their roles within the classroom change (Delisle, 1997). The teacher is traditionally at the front of the classroom, transferring his or her knowledge by way of lecture, notetaking, and modeling. With problem-based learning, the teacher steps away from the front of the classroom and instead partners with students to guide them in discovering their own learning. The teacher provides questioning and resources as well as a task or problem for the students to figure out.
In August, I began teaching from a new-to-our-district math curriculum called Connected Math Project 2. The foundation of this program is discovery learning and real life application of math skills (http://connectedmath.msu.edu/). I have had 4 weeks of experience with this curriculum, and so far, I am incredibly impressed! It was (and still is) difficult for me to let go of my traditional role. In the first week reflection I wrote on my lesson plans, “My students are capable of so much more than I ever gave them credit for. They have brains that are capable of thinking and not just regurgitating. They have multiple ideas for solving the same problems, and have the ability to reflect on their successes and failures.” Since then, I have seen the students work together in ways that I never thought possible. They are focused on the math task, and the most amazing part to me is that their dialogue is focused on the math at hand.
The reflection process on this topic has led me to refine the way that I do my job. My goal is create a safe environment for my students to explore and discover math topics through real-life application. Students will be successful and students will fail, but most of all, students will learn from their own experiences as well as the experiences of their peers as a result of math-focused conversation.
Delisle, R. (1997). How to use problem based learning in the classroom. Retrieved from http://books.google.com/booksid=9nZPZ6N27EEC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_v2_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q=&f=false
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