Skip to main content

Block 1

My first block was a great first experience teaching in a high school classroom. I had the opportunity to teach a Grade 10 Academic Math class and it was a true testament to my passion for teaching and a clear indicator that I was right where I have wanted to be. I got to finish up a unit on quadratics, teaching concepts such as completing the square, quadratic formula, and problem solving. This was definitely a tricky unit for my students, as each new concept in quadratics builds off of the previous one, and many students struggled to keep up with the pace. Overall the unit was well done, although it is safe to say that the students were very happy to be done with it when it was over (seeing as it was the last of 3 units on quadratics). During this unit I was able to use Desmos to make graphing and visually representing quadratic functions quick and easy for my students. I often used this technology during my lessons and I also allowed students to use it for exploration activities. This tool was definitely an asset to teaching quadratic functions.

In my last week before finishing my block, I introduced a new unit on Trigonometry, Students were very excited to see something different and it was fun for me to revisit a topic that I haven't looked at in many years. I needed to refresh myself a lot more than I did with the functions unit, however it was a great challenge to re-learn the material and formulate it into lessons that Grade 10s would understand. I used a Gizmos activity to teach similar triangles and the students really enjoyed playing around on it. I could see how it helped to develop a concrete understanding of the properties of similar triangles that the students used throughout the remainder of the unit.

Reflecting back on my block, I had an amazing experience. I thoroughly enjoyed teaching mathematics and experimenting
with different teaching styles, techniques, and tools. Completing this block makes me excited for the next one, and more importantly for my career as a teacher!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Japanese Bansho Method

In class we were introduced to a type of activity for problem solving called the Japanese Bansho Method. Ottawa Bansho defines Bansho as "a method of teaching developed in Japan that focuses on teaching math through problem solving. It allows students to see connections and progressions of the thinking involved when developing strategies to solve a problem" (https://ottawabansho.wordpress.com/bansho-in-the-class/). At first glance, this method seemed the same as the gallery walk activity that we had used in a previous class. However, this method takes solutions one step further by having students group and categorize solutions based on level of difficulty. We began the activity by solving a problem about a class with a certain number of boys and girls in it. This appeared to be a fairly simple problem, however we were again challenged to create multiple solutions. Each different solution was written on a separate piece of paper and posted on the board. Once all of the solut...
Post a Comment
Read more

Exploring Different Solving Techniques

During class, we were given a fairly simple problem involving solving for maximum area of a box. We were asked to solve the problem among our desk groups. Fairly quickly, we were able to find a solution using algebraic methods. Based on our group's advanced background in mathematics, this problem appeared trivial and was not difficult to solve. We were then asked to come up with at least one other method of solving the same problem. This should have been easy - right? Wrong. Thinking outside of what we knew proved to be more difficult than I thought. I was stumped when it came to figuring out another way of solving. One of my group members suggested using a table of values and more of a trial-and-error method to come up with a solution. This seemed so tedious and unnecessary to me, given that I already solved the problem much quicker using my own method. However, we went ahead and used the new method and came up with an identical answer. This made me think - why would anyone so...
Post a Comment
Read more