It was not quite clear in the article whether the list of "complicating factors" was a historical piece in Mathematics education or these are some of the current factors that are being faced. This area was the most fascinating and the most relatable area of the article for me.
- "mathematics is hard, cold, distant and inhuman" (Pg. 3)
I can understand that it can be hard and cold and you can feel distant about it as you may not understand its depth fully. However, how can it be inhuman? Math is inside of you and the outside of you. Your lungs move as you inhale and exhale, your brain shoots neurons as they detect an activity, you blink when your eyes get tired, all these things have a pattern. You are able to understand all these things because of math. You are able to understand the concept of balance because of math. Math cannot be inhuman. However, I will not be surprised if I get one of my students throw this term at me while they are struggling to understand something a little challenging for their brain. Something becomes inhuman when you feel beaten up after trying to understand it multiple times. This is a common feeling, it may happen while understanding chemistry or a poem or trying to make a goal at a soccer game. Any time a person feels defeated after trying over and over, they feel like the thing they are trying to achieve is inhuman. Math is comparatively a little more challenging than the other subjects taught at school which makes it the most inhuman. We, as teachers, have to be proud of the fact that we get to teach our students the most inhuman subject, not the only inhuman subject. However, it remains a question how can we make it human for them and that is a much broad subject.
Thursday 22 October 2015
Micro-Lesson Experience
Hello Everyone!
My Micro-lesson teaching experience was a great one. I so glad that I was able to follow the lesson plan I had come up with before class worked out so well but at the same time I was able to make a few on the spot changes which are essential for a teacher to be able to make.
I started off with the question I had planned to pose to my group but I did not know that I could get them to guess what language it was that they were looking at and then me trying to give them hints as they guessed the languages was a great addition to the hook of my lesson. I proceeded with what I had planned on earlier but I knew that I may have some extra time towards the end as we only had 4 people in our group, Ying Ting had to leave earlier. I went around the table and showed everyone how to write their name in Punjabi while telling them a little bit about alphabets and sounds of the Punjabi language. As I was doing so, Jessica asked a few questions that made me realize that I am not just a teacher at the moment, I am also a student. She asked me about the correct way of writing an alphabet in Punjabi, whether to go from bottom to top, left to right or the other way around. Her thoughtful questions added a great energy in my lesson as I had not thought about this question when I was planning my lesson. I took the challenge and taught a little bit about technicalities like this to everyone.
Towards the end of my lesson, as I had 2 minutes left and I had covered pretty much everything I had planned to, I decided to do an additional activity as I had the time for it. I asked my group whether they wanted to learn how to write their names in Hindi as well and they all looked at me with a smile and said why not. I quickly wrote their names in Hindi on their paper and told them that they can go home and practice as we won't have enough time right now. In addition to writing their names in Hindi, some asked me to write other phrases in Hindi/Punjabi for them as that might come in handy sometime in the future for them.
It was a great experience as I saw such positive attitude from all my group mates and their feedback was very helpful as well. All three of them mentioned in their feedback that this was a great lesson as they may not have gotten a chance to learn how to write their names in Hindi/Punjabi anywhere else.
Tuesday 20 October 2015
Lesson Plan for Micro-Teaching
Hello Everyone!
I would follow the following plan for my micro-teaching lesson tomorrow in class:
30 Sec- I will have "Welcome" written on a full piece of paper in Punjabi and Hindi and I will show it to my group as we start and ask them if they know what it says?
30 Sec- How many of you know how to write your name in a language other than English? &
How many of you know how to write your name in Punjabi/Hindi? (Reminder to tell that it said "Welcome" on the sign).
20 Sec: Material: I provide them with a piece of paper and a pen each and introduce the lesson as I am distributing paper and pen
4 Min 40 Sec- Lesson: I go around the table and write their name in Punjabi on their paper (big enough and slow enough so that they can copy) while others observe how the language is written. Then I ask the person to write it 5 times or more, under where I wrote to practice while I go to the next person and write their name and so on. If I have 5 people on my table it should take me no more than 4 mins and 40 seconds to do this and I am taking account of the last person I teach how to write their name and give them time to write it 5 times. (I am 6 minutes down in my lesson at this point)
30 Sec- I will ask them if they have any questions or they need clarification on any letters and will look at their work and correct if they did not follow right. (this will be done as a group)
1 Min 30 Sec- I will ask them to turn the paper over and try to write their name in Punjabi, without looking if they can but they can look back to take hints.
1 Min- Any last minute questions and let them know that I can also write Hindi, so if they are interested in learning how to write their name in Hindi they can ask me after class.
Cool Fact: As we are wrapping up, I tell them that Punjabi is the third-most-spoken-language in Canada.
I would follow the following plan for my micro-teaching lesson tomorrow in class:
30 Sec- I will have "Welcome" written on a full piece of paper in Punjabi and Hindi and I will show it to my group as we start and ask them if they know what it says?
30 Sec- How many of you know how to write your name in a language other than English? &
How many of you know how to write your name in Punjabi/Hindi? (Reminder to tell that it said "Welcome" on the sign).
20 Sec: Material: I provide them with a piece of paper and a pen each and introduce the lesson as I am distributing paper and pen
4 Min 40 Sec- Lesson: I go around the table and write their name in Punjabi on their paper (big enough and slow enough so that they can copy) while others observe how the language is written. Then I ask the person to write it 5 times or more, under where I wrote to practice while I go to the next person and write their name and so on. If I have 5 people on my table it should take me no more than 4 mins and 40 seconds to do this and I am taking account of the last person I teach how to write their name and give them time to write it 5 times. (I am 6 minutes down in my lesson at this point)
30 Sec- I will ask them if they have any questions or they need clarification on any letters and will look at their work and correct if they did not follow right. (this will be done as a group)
1 Min 30 Sec- I will ask them to turn the paper over and try to write their name in Punjabi, without looking if they can but they can look back to take hints.
1 Min- Any last minute questions and let them know that I can also write Hindi, so if they are interested in learning how to write their name in Hindi they can ask me after class.
Cool Fact: As we are wrapping up, I tell them that Punjabi is the third-most-spoken-language in Canada.
Saturday 17 October 2015
Big Soup Can problem
I found out online that the overall dimensions of a regular Cambell's soup can is 4 x 2.625 x 2.625 inches. If we convert this into cm, this would be 10.16 x 6.67 x 6.67 cm.
Therefore, the volume of the can is going to be pi*(radius^2)*height. Radius will be half of the diameter which is 6.67/ 2= 3.34 cm. The volume in cm would be: pi*(3.34^2)*10.16= 356.07 cm^3.
Then I searched online and found out that for Susan's high (5 feet 5 inches, as she mentioned in the class), a road bike should be around 54 cm.
By looking at the picture given of the bike in front of the big soup can, one can see that if you have 2.5 bikes stacked on top of each other in place of one bike in the picture, that would give us the approximate diameter of the big soup can. Therefore, 2.5 times the height of Susan's bike: 2.5* 54 cm= 135 cm is approximate diameter of the can.
Now we can come up with an algebraic equation as follows with the given information:
Let x= height of the big soup can.
diameter of the big soup can= 135 cm
height of the normal soup can= 10.16 cm
diameter of the normal soup can = 6.67 cm
Therefore: (135/ 6.67)* 10.16 = 205.64 cm = x
From this we can find the volume of the big soup can that is:
pi*(67.5^2)*205.64 = 2943506.60 cm^3.
Therefore,
The height of the big soup can= 205.64 cm
The diameter of the big soup can= 135 cm
Volume of the big soup can= 2943506. 60 cm
Therefore, the volume of the can is going to be pi*(radius^2)*height. Radius will be half of the diameter which is 6.67/ 2= 3.34 cm. The volume in cm would be: pi*(3.34^2)*10.16= 356.07 cm^3.
Then I searched online and found out that for Susan's high (5 feet 5 inches, as she mentioned in the class), a road bike should be around 54 cm.
By looking at the picture given of the bike in front of the big soup can, one can see that if you have 2.5 bikes stacked on top of each other in place of one bike in the picture, that would give us the approximate diameter of the big soup can. Therefore, 2.5 times the height of Susan's bike: 2.5* 54 cm= 135 cm is approximate diameter of the can.
Now we can come up with an algebraic equation as follows with the given information:
Let x= height of the big soup can.
diameter of the big soup can= 135 cm
height of the normal soup can= 10.16 cm
diameter of the normal soup can = 6.67 cm
Therefore: (135/ 6.67)* 10.16 = 205.64 cm = x
From this we can find the volume of the big soup can that is:
pi*(67.5^2)*205.64 = 2943506.60 cm^3.
Therefore,
The height of the big soup can= 205.64 cm
The diameter of the big soup can= 135 cm
Volume of the big soup can= 2943506. 60 cm
Wednesday 14 October 2015
Borromean rings project experience
Hello Everyone!
I had the pleasure to work with a great team of three, Jordon, Pacus and myself. I was kind of nervous in the beginning as we were the only group who had the least number of people but I turned out that we three were a great team. As Susan had provided a link for the borrromean ring project, it turned out that it was the only website that had any information on the cube that we wanted to make. As soon as we realized that this was our only source with very brief description on how to make the cube, we decided to follow the only picture avaiable on the website. It was interesting how we collectively figured out the base case of the cube which was the real borromean ring of the structure. After we figured out the base case, we tried to apply the same technique to the base that we needed for the cube which involved 3 paper clips for each side, total 9 paper clips. It was difficult to work with 9 paper clips as it required a lot of force to bend them and Pearce through them. It was exciting to finally have a base for our cube that involved 9 paper clips. After this the process seemrd easy as we just had to repeat what we had done until we realized that the paper clips that we had were too small to hold a cube that had 3 layers of 3 paper clips on each side. Therefore, we ended up making a cube that was hollow from inside but had the same structure as the one that we saw online.
Along with this experience i also want to share my inquiry experience that lead me to make a shape that had 8 triangles and multiple parallelograms. I was simply playing around with paper clips using the borromean ring idea and came up with this structure. Overall, it was a very good experience and that you can come up with completely something new on our own was an incredible feeling.
I had the pleasure to work with a great team of three, Jordon, Pacus and myself. I was kind of nervous in the beginning as we were the only group who had the least number of people but I turned out that we three were a great team. As Susan had provided a link for the borrromean ring project, it turned out that it was the only website that had any information on the cube that we wanted to make. As soon as we realized that this was our only source with very brief description on how to make the cube, we decided to follow the only picture avaiable on the website. It was interesting how we collectively figured out the base case of the cube which was the real borromean ring of the structure. After we figured out the base case, we tried to apply the same technique to the base that we needed for the cube which involved 3 paper clips for each side, total 9 paper clips. It was difficult to work with 9 paper clips as it required a lot of force to bend them and Pearce through them. It was exciting to finally have a base for our cube that involved 9 paper clips. After this the process seemrd easy as we just had to repeat what we had done until we realized that the paper clips that we had were too small to hold a cube that had 3 layers of 3 paper clips on each side. Therefore, we ended up making a cube that was hollow from inside but had the same structure as the one that we saw online.
Along with this experience i also want to share my inquiry experience that lead me to make a shape that had 8 triangles and multiple parallelograms. I was simply playing around with paper clips using the borromean ring idea and came up with this structure. Overall, it was a very good experience and that you can come up with completely something new on our own was an incredible feeling.
Letters from "future ex-students"
Hello Everyone!
1) Dear Teacher,
I wanted to let you know that I have been accepted at UBC for the B.Ed. program to become a Math teacher soon. It is all your hard work that is paying off and I am where I am today. If you hadn't taught me long and difficult calculus formulas in a fun musical way that you did, I would not have been able to get through my undergrad as a Math major. Thank you for helping me fall in love with math by having faith in me that I could do better. I get to show off my math skills in front of my friends when I solve the rubik's cube in front of them. Thank you for encouraging us to learn how to solve the rubik's cube and many other cool things. Most of all, I am thankful for you to motivate me to become a Math teacher just like you and that too without ever explicitly saying it to me.
2) Dear Teacher,
I am so excited to tell you that I have been accepted at SFU in the biology program for my undergrad. I have been so excited with this news that I decided to email all of my high school teachers and give them this great news. I know this will not be super exciting for you as I am not pursuing math in my post secondary education; however, I wanted to keep you posted anyway. I know you tried your best but maybe math was not my thing. I never understood those derivatives and integrals that you taught us in the calculus class but I remember you always offering me extra help after school. So, thank you for trying even when I had decided that I cannot do math.
1) Dear Teacher,
I wanted to let you know that I have been accepted at UBC for the B.Ed. program to become a Math teacher soon. It is all your hard work that is paying off and I am where I am today. If you hadn't taught me long and difficult calculus formulas in a fun musical way that you did, I would not have been able to get through my undergrad as a Math major. Thank you for helping me fall in love with math by having faith in me that I could do better. I get to show off my math skills in front of my friends when I solve the rubik's cube in front of them. Thank you for encouraging us to learn how to solve the rubik's cube and many other cool things. Most of all, I am thankful for you to motivate me to become a Math teacher just like you and that too without ever explicitly saying it to me.
2) Dear Teacher,
I am so excited to tell you that I have been accepted at SFU in the biology program for my undergrad. I have been so excited with this news that I decided to email all of my high school teachers and give them this great news. I know this will not be super exciting for you as I am not pursuing math in my post secondary education; however, I wanted to keep you posted anyway. I know you tried your best but maybe math was not my thing. I never understood those derivatives and integrals that you taught us in the calculus class but I remember you always offering me extra help after school. So, thank you for trying even when I had decided that I cannot do math.
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