As an international teacher I find myself moving countries and changing schools every 2-4 years. These moments of transition, when I know I'll be starting over again in a new location, with new students, at a new school, give me a chance to really consider what I consider to be core elements to what I want to be included in my classroom. What is it that I am so convinced students need that I want to continue to make sure that I include them in my next location? This is the point I am at yet again as I get ready to transition from Paraguay to India. What do I want to make sure I take with me? What do I want to work to implement?
My fundamental beliefs about math education
- students have to do math in order to know if they understand it or not
- it takes more than one attempt to know if you can do a problem, it might be chance you got the correct answer the first time
- students need to be able to talk about math, not just do it
- math is much more interesting if you can figure out how to tie it to the real world experiences students have
- it is okay to make mistakes
- students have to be comfortable enough to ask questions, even if the answer seems obvious to me
- it takes multiple exposures to material for a student to be able to claim the knowledge
- when you can help students make connections (to other math topics, to other subjects, to real life) they are more likely to own their knowledge
Hopefully, as I get closer to the transition I will be thinking about how these are implemented in my classroom and what I want to retain/throw away as I move on. What about you? What are your core beliefs and elements?
