Hi, Folks,
This answer would totally get a 100% in my class.
Ugh. Math. Hated it. Most adults I know claims that math was a struggle for them, but I really, really had a tough time with it. I made it through the early years fairly well, but by fourth grade, I was a hopeless case.. Hours of crying over worksheets, stacks of failed tests, ineffective and frustrated tutors. Then there was my sweet, glassy-eyed Geometry teacher, Keith Robine, who gave me this oh so sage advice: “Just jive with the cosine, Amanda, jive with the cosine.” Soon after that stroke of brilliance, he resigned from teaching devote his life to brewing herbal tea outside of Grateful Dead shows. Sorry, Mr. R, your tea was quite tasty, but I have yet to jive with the cosine. Nor can I boogie with binomials or samba with square roots, and I once twisted my axis of symmetry attempting to perform the hypotenuse hippie dance.
But here’s the crazy thing:
Math is my favorite subject to teach.
You see, what I now realize about my math education is that I spent way too much time and energy trying to memorize proofs and formulas, without understanding what math really is: a fun way to solve mysteries. Yeah, I said fun. Sometimes these mysteries have definite answers, sometimes not, but there are many, many different ways to get to those answers. It’s the process of solving the mystery, as well as finding a personal connection to it, rather than the correct answer. Yes, correct answers are important, but more often than not, an incorrect answer can be an important clue as well. Don’t get me wrong, being able to regurgitate facts can come in handy, but not when these facts aren’t paired with a deep and true understanding of why and how these facts are meaningful and useful.
For example, I have worked with many children who can tell me in an instant that 5 x 12= 60 , but can’t tell me if I can feed a class of 7 children with 5 dozen donuts. Last week at our bake sale, some of the kids who can count money into the thousands were baffled when they wanted to purchase a treat for $.50, but they had a dollar bill to pay for it.
I was one of those kids. I now realize that I never internalized the “whys” of math. I never “owned” it by connecting with the meaning. Children are naturally curious, and math exploration occurs constantly in our class. Sometimes through structured lessons, sometimes through play, and often totally by accident. I could stand in the front of the class and teach it until I’m blue in the face, but theses kids just won’t “get it” until it makes sense to them in the context of their world. Therefore, we try to seize as many mathematical moments as we can in the class. Spend time in the Predator’s class and you often hear Erin and I questioning the students to get them to think about math:
Why do you think we bake the cookies for 20 minutes instead of 10 minutes or an hour?
What if there were two more students in class; how many more pencils would you need to pass out?
What if you didn’t have any long rectangular blocks? Could you still build a similar structure?
Do you think a brownie should cost 50 cents or three dollars? Why?
Why was it so easy for the wolf to blow down the straw house? What other materials would be easy/hard to blow down and why?
How can we divide up our 12 Days of Halloween song so that everyone has the same amount of verses?
How can we best maximize our recess activities with the amount of time that we have left? If we spend ten minutes disagreeing, how much time have we lost?
What is the best method for dealing cards for a game of UNO?
Who has a different answer? Who has the same answer, but a different way to explain it?
How do you know?
Does that always work?
Does this remind you of any problem we’ve seen before?
All of the brain and body work that Erin has been working with on with your kids: Math!
They use their bodies to explore patterns, sequencing, rhythm, reversing, addition, subtraction, size and dimensions, perspective, symmetry, and many other concepts.
We play games every day to deepen understanding of math, as well as work on skill building and teamwork. A lot of games. Here are some we have enjoyed so far:
*Logical Reasoning: Mastermind, Digit Place, Poison, Secret Square, Simpatico, Train, Guess My Rule
*Numbers and operations: Go to the Dump, Name that Number, Multiplication Concentration, Race to $1.00, Spill and Compare, Hit the Target, Parking Lot, Clean up the Money, Underwater Number Line
*Probability and Statistics: Shake and Spill, Two Coin Toss, The Game of Pig, Clear the Board
*Geometry: Geoboard Mirrors, Pattern Block Roll, Stack Master, Out of Shape, Fill in the Hexagon
*Measurement: How Tall am I? Domino Distances, Coin Rolls
Curious about any of these games? Just ask and I will happily send home details. They are all kid tested, teacher approved.
Lest you think all we did was crunch numbers this week, I will leave you with a link to one of three of our awesome performances of “The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs”. Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W_PDr0Qrtw&feature=email
Have a great weekend!
Amanda and Erin
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