My Maths Journey

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I could confidently say, throughout primary school I was one of the best in my class at maths, I was bursting with confidence in the subject and I found every aspect of it painfully easy. On my final day of primary school I even received a prize for maths, I was that good at it.

However, after my transition into high school it all went downhill. I began to find maths extremely difficult and I seriously lacked the confidence to progress in the subject. I was never bad at maths, I still remained in the top class for my year group but something had changed. I was now the worst at maths in my class and I felt too stupid to ever ask my teacher for help.

A well-known saying is: “a good workman never blames his tools” but I am going to contradict that by placing most of the blame on my high school maths teacher for my lack of confidence. He snapped at me whenever I asked him for help and he even told my mum at parents evening that there was no chance of me passing the subject. He was wrong, I sit here today with a C in higher maths, a very low C, but still a pass.

In my experience, those who were good at maths were regarded much smarter than someone who was good at history or art. I think this is a main reason as to why the subject intimidated me slightly when it came to secondary school. Another reason is that I strongly believed the myth that we were born with either a mathematical or a literacy brain, I was always good at history so I then decided that it just wasn’t in my genes to be talented at maths.

There is also another myth circulating that people wont need maths once they leave school. I feel very strongly against this as we use maths in many aspects of life. When I get on the bus every morning I have to deal with money which is pretty much basic maths that I learned in primary school. When I become a teacher maths will be a large part of my job so that directly proves that this myth is rubbish.

I aim to incorporate group work into my maths lessons because I feel that children will be more likely to ask for help when they are in a group rather than on their own. As well as this speaking out in class is much less daunting because it wont be as humiliating giving a wrong answer when it is a group effort.

In today’s maths input there was an extremely interesting saying:

I hear, I forget

I see, I remember

I do, I understand

This backs up the idea that group work among other things, may be beneficial. Children learn better by actually trying things out instead of just working from textbooks. If they can apply their maths to everyday life and make it interesting they are more likely to remember it in the years to come.

What Does it Mean to be an Enquiring Practitioner?

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The general definition of enquiry would along the lines of asking something, so I would say an enquiring practitioner would be someone who is constantly questioning their practice. It can also be explained as some sort of investigation. This can be carried out alone or with colleagues and is extremely beneficial so teaching as it means constant improvement. By constantly questioning our own practice we will then be able to identify areas of improvement so that we can be the best teachers possible.

Practitioner enquiry has many benefits as well as development of own practice, it can empower teachers and give them control over what they teach and this can be very motivational. It also means that we can go further than just the classroom, practitioner enquiry could eventually change and improve the whole education system. This is due to the fact that it is highly adaptive and questioning is greatly encouraged by both pupils and teachers.

Personally I would say that working collegiately is a great was to improve the system of practitioner enquiry because teachers then have a chance to consolidate ideas and come up with the best solution which may lead to greater improvement.

Jack in the box

It can allow us to come up with different teaching strategies based on strengths and weaknesses in past lessons. It gives teachers a wider knowledge base due to questioning and being critical. This is beneficial because if teachers can improve their own knowledge base then that means that there is far more knowledge to then be passed on pupils/colleagues.

A main challenge of being an enquiring practitioner would be taking criticism from others without getting offended and having the ability to criticize friends without feeling emotionally attached.

What is Reflection?

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I personally found this question extremely difficult to answer as there are so many different examples and definitions of reflection. This video helped me greatly in my attempt to understand what it actually is:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wHANninAl4

It starts by saying it is the ability to consider solutions to problems. Although very broad, I somewhat agree with this statement. Reflection is using past experience and knowledge to actually solve a problem. For example, if I was to fail an assignment (hopefully that wont happen) I would look at what I actually did wrong and I would use this for my future assigments to avoid making the same mistakes again. This is reflection, in a way it is an ‘action plan’ to help improve our learning.

It could also be said that reflection links to being self-critical. If we reflect after each lesson we deliver we can identify which aspects we could improve on. It is important to accept that we will make mistakes so that we can enhance our teaching methods and reach our full potential.

The Construction of the Professional

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There are a number of key qualities and attributes that play an important role in the construction of a professional and they are all beneficial in different ways when it comes to teaching. I have chosen to focus on five qualities that I think are key to possess when teaching children:

Patience
Tolerance
Kindness
Fairness
Empathy

Patience

For a teacher, patience means having the ability to stay calm if a child is really pushing it, it is the ability to never give up on a child no matter how tough they are being. it is an important skill to have because if a teacher wasn’t patient they probably wouldn’t really enjoy their job, it would be hard to see children improve if teachers did not possess the patience to work with them, to help them do the best they can do and to work hard with them so that they can get better at anything that they struggle with.

Tolerance

This, I feel comes hand in hand with patience. Similarly, for a teacher this means that they should be able to keep a cool head when it comes to bad behaviour and deal with it calmly. when working with kids it is important to be extremely tolerant as children will be noisy and they will muck around. it is important for a teacher to allow some fun and be tolerant to a certain extent when it comes to noise and mess.

Kindness

I believe that having the ability to be kind is extremely important when it comes to teaching. Children need to feel like they can approach their teacher and not be scared to ask questions. However, it is important to not be too kind and let the children take advantage, a teacher should be approachable but not so approachable that the children feel like they can walk all over them.

Fairness

A teacher should always be fair, this means that they should always treat every child the same. It is important to reward children when they deserve it and similarly to make a child aware if they have done something wrong and take appropriate action. A teacher should always remain consistency and should not favour some children over others.

Empathy

This is an extremely important quality to have. A teacher should be able to understand how a child is feeling and consider how this may effect their behaviour or concentration in school. They must be able to understand why a child is acting in a certain way so that they can figure out how to improve behaviour or decide how to deal with a situation.

Professionalism and The Online World

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Social media is an extremely modern and useful tool for primary teachers but only if it is used in the correct way. We must learn to keep our personal and professional uses of social media separate if we can not behave in a way that is appropriate because if we fail to do so then this may endanger our fitness to teach according to the General Teaching Council Scotland’s code of conduct.

When using the internet in a professional way there are a number of challenges as well as opportunities that teachers may be faced with when marrying their personal and professional presence on social media. A main challenge I feel would be maintaining boundaries with pupils, keeping a professional relationship online. it is important that both teachers and children know the difference between communicating professionally and chatting with friends in an informal manner. Teachers need to know how to communicate appropriately with their pupils and it is important to know what is acceptable.

Another issue for teachers may be the children’s parent’s looking them up online, they must not post anything on social media that may be deemed inappropriate. For example pictures that include nudity or last weekends drunken antics.

it is important to consider that even though using social media in teaching has some key challenges, there are a number of opportunities that it provides. A main benefit would be the aspect of communication. It is important for a teacher and their pupils to have a good level of communication because it helps to form a stronger professional relationship. Children will be more likely to ask for help and support if their is good communication. Building a good relationship with pupils also tends to help improve behaviour, a teacher will find it easier to control a class if they can identify what is causing bad behaviour.

Children are very in tune with technology these days from an early age, it seems to interest them greatly, this is a key reason why technology is beneficial to the learning environment as children will learn more if they are actually interested in what thy are doing.

Overall I do think the benefits of using social media in teaching far outweigh the drawbacks if it is used correctly. It is important to marry personal and professional presence on social media in such a way that there are still boundaries.

I would personally like to frame social media using a mainly positive viewpoint, I feel this is appropriate as if used correctly it is an extremely useful learning tool, it opens up a world of extra resources and it is a far more entertaining way for primary children to learn. However, both teachers and pupils must always be aware of the dangers and challenges that we face while using social media, it can really make or break the learning experience.

Online Units Section 1C, The Benefits of Active Learning and Co-Operative Working

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When faced with completing this task I firstly attempted to find a definition for active learning, Education Scotland website came up with the ide that it is a sort of learning that really challenges a way a child thinks and it des this by using situations that are both real-life and imaginary. this website also provides examples of this being used in practice which I find very useful. Here is the link just in case anyone is interested:

http://www.educationscotland.gov.uk/learningandteaching/approaches/activelearning/

So what exactly are the benefits of active learning?

I personally think that this learning style has an endless amount of benefits, it is exactly what children want to be doing in class. it is exciting because it is an extremely hands on approach and children are less likely to get bored. As a result of children being more entertained behaviour may improve also. Young children shouldn’t be stuck in seats all day copying from a board, they need to get up and get moving and that’s exactly what the active learning approach is looking to do.

What are the benefits of co-operative working?

I would personally say that working co-operatively to study for something is extremely useful, it creates that security of knowing that people are thinking the same as you, its a good way of finding out if you are actually on the right track too, similarly if you are doing things completely wrong it makes it easier to find that out before it is too late. Working co-operatively is useful for more than just study, group tasks can create friendships and build confidence when speaking to new people. It may also mean that overall the work produced is of a higher standard because people have been able to discuss many points and have more ideas to put down. The benefits and drawbacks of each idea have been discussed before a conclusion has been reached.

However, there are also a few drawbacks to co-operative working, when working in groups the discussion may often end up going off topic and this may result in little or no work being done. Also, if there is a disagreement within the group then that may effect the quality of discussion.

Overall, there are many benefits of both active learning and co-operative working and I think they both contribute greatly to the future of education.

Gender TDT

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Gender affected me particularly in primary school, mainly due to my choice of friends because, to the disgust of many of the girls in my class, my first best friend was in fact a boy. My female classmates didn’t seem to accept that, they acted as if it was wrong or like it was against the unwritten rules of society even at the ages of four or five.

In the early years of primary school it almost felt like teachers were brainwashing us to act in a certain way according to our gender, I was frequently told to “sit like a lady” in school, mainly by the older teachers. This may have been due to their old fashioned approach to what actually defines gender. Another clear memory that stuck in my mind regarding gender was that boys seemed to always get in more trouble than girls for doing the exact same thing. It’s almost as if young boys were expected to behave badly and so the teachers lacked patience when they misbehaved.

I certainly do feel that gender greatly influenced my time at primary school. As I moved further up the school in to primary four and even in primary five I no longer had male friends. There was always this idea that “boys were smelly” and I think this was mainly due to the fact that primary four was roughly when boys and girls started “fancying” each other.

Finally, gender also had an influence over my time in high school mainly through gender separated PE classes but I can confidently say that this was not in any way a negative influence and I was completely thankful of it.

Why teaching?

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One of the main reasons for my decision to study Education at Dundee University would probably be due to the positive memories that I still have of some of my own Primary Teachers. In particular, my Primary 7 teacher. He never lacked enthusiasm and always made everyone in the classroom feel supported and included. In the future, I hope to mirror this enthusiasm as well as doing my very best to ensure that every child in the classroom feels accepted and equal.

Another factor that greatly influenced my future career choice would be my current part-time job at a local kid’s club. I enjoy the fact that no two days will ever be the same. Also I know that primary teaching can be extremely rewarding as it will be my role to assist pupils in overcoming any obstacles that they may have.

I also aim to create a good balance within the classroom, one of which that the atmosphere is relaxed enough so that the children are never afraid to ask for help when it is needed but also so they know the level of behaviour that is expected of them. I feel that if I succeed to create this atmosphere then it will greatly contribute to the creation of many positive memories of Primary School for the children I teach, just like the memories that I already I have. I feel that this is extremely important in helping the children to gain confidence for their progression to High School at the end of primary 7.