Month: November 2018

Education has always been something that I’ve been interested in. I was the girl who loved going to school, even at a young age I knew that I wanted to be a teacher and to make a difference. I had the opportunity to go back to my high school, Bishop Connolly High School, and observe a class.

I visited my old history/ American government teacher, Mr. Vieira.  He is a teacher that is filled with knowledge and wisdom, and his classes for me at least I always enjoyed. I sat in on an American Government honors class. As soon as I walked in I saw Mr. Vieira. He stood tall with a striped button up shirt, dress pants, and his grey hair combed back like it always was. Every student that walked in looked the same, girls wearing a skirt and an Oxford or a polo. Boys wearing khakis with an Oxford or polo. They all sat down at the desks waiting for the lecture to begin. Looking around the class I noticed each individual. A girl with curly red hair was opening her notebook and looking through it. The boy next to her with the blonde hair pushed to the side with black square shaped glasses was on his Macbook typing away.   Each student was sitting at a table, the tables were shaped like a U. Mr. Veiera’s desk was right in the middle of the classroom facing all of the students.  Right behind his desk was a screen where a power point would be presented. As I started to look around more I  noticed this class was a large size, around 24 students.

Mr. Vieria started to begin class. He began talking about the bill of rights and amendments as the powerpoint started. Looking around most all of the students seemed to be engaged in the powerpoint. Either typing away on their Computers, Highlighting in their printed out powerpoint, or writing down notes.  Mr. Veiria interacted with the students a lot, asking many questions like what is the bill of rights? what are the 2nd amendments?  When was the bill of rights written?  Multiple students would raise their hands and answer the question correctly.  After that, the powerpoint went on discussing the different amendments. Mr. Vieira would even state some facts that he knew about certain amendments.

Class went on and there were about 10 minutes of class left. Mr. Vieira stopped going over the powerpoint and he sat down at his desk in the middle of the room. Students started to pack up putting their notebooks in their backpacks, put their computers in their cases.  Mr. Veiria then started to ask the students how was their weekend? Most students blurted out good.  He then said Well if it was good then what did you guys do? A girl was Brown straight hair raised her hand. Her name was Sarah, she said that she went to New Hampshire for the weekend and went ziplining.  A couple other students shared their stories of what they did for the weekend. Then the loud bell rang at 9:25am and the class was over. Students all walked out into the tiny hallway and were on their way to the next class.

Math, a complex subject that most of us hate doing or aren’t that great at it. While some are good at math, I was never that person. I struggled with math all my life, it also seems like many Americans are bad at math. We’re a culture that makes it okay to be bad at math. But is that okay?

In ” Why do Americans stink at math?” By Elizabeth green. Discusses what most young American students go through. It is not uncommon for students to not do well in math. Within this article,  the author discusses  Takahashi in 1978, a college student in Tokyo, and his mission to make math become easier to learn, with different ways of teaching it.

Having a desire to make learning math easier for students, he became the only thing he thought would do that.  Akihiko Takahashi became an elementary school teacher, but in Japan, he taught college students who aspired to become teachers as well.  He brought teaching to another level, teaching like no one before. He turned his classroom into a laboratory.  He decided to change the way students should study, instead of having them memorize equations and practice problems, just like how we do in American schools now.  He decided to have discussions among the class, and by doing this having the students work out the problems themselves.   Over the next 12 years, the Japanese educational system used this approach when it came to teaching math.  In 1991, at the age of 58, he had an opportunity to teach in America, a school run by Japanese.  He had a desire to be the center of new math.  He started to visit American schools, he would see that Americans had this dream way to teach math but they would fail.

American teachers failed guidance,  were unprepared, they were damaging students more than they were helping them.  A reform to change math but it’s without a good system for helping teachers be able to learn to teach them.  Teachers are doing different types of training constantly to keep up with what’s new and learning it themselves, so how can they teach it? I have experienced this many times. I’ve had teachers tell the class that they learned this new concept and a new way to teach but it never helped any of the students.   One of my teachers was taught a new way to do an algebra problem, but instead of trying to help they just made the class more confused. It only made math 10x harder. I understand trying to educate teachers more that way they can educate us and make our generation better than there’s. Though it is not helping, from experience. I think teachers need to know concepts fully before deciding to teach it. Students know don’t know basic math concepts like how to multiply or divide, use arithmetic and applying it to daily life. Teachers are unprepared, setting the children back in their education.

In countries like Japan, they have a similar approach but their success with it is incredible, while in America maybe we aren’t suited for this just yet. On an average test, two-thirds of fourth graders and eighth graders are not skilled in math.  Same goes with on multiple choice test, the students could not comprehend the question.  Even in our home state of Massachusetts, one of the states highest performing with math, the average student is two years behind in math, versus in other countries like Japan. The unschooled are more capable of math that’s complex than the students who have been taught it. The students being taught aren’t comprehended it. Instead, they are only getting more confused, and they aren’t learning much at all.

Almost all of the American math classes have the same structure and follow the same pattern.  We are focusing on procedures but not that the procedures mean.  Students aren’t able to apply the problem strategy to new problems. I dealt with that constantly with math through the years. American institutions that have charged teachers to learn new procedures in math have shown unable to do it.  If teachers are not getting the right training then they are unable to teach math the right way or understand it themselves.  The training is weak and just leading to inefficient teachers. As a teacher, you have the power in your hands to educate the next generation. It is your job to bring them on the path of success, if you’re failing by teaching them, then what’s your purpose? I personally would like if math would be taught the way it is taught in Japan in America. I feel being taught math over the years that we are just given a problem and have to solve it on your own. By doing this I’m not learning the steps and what each of them means to solve problems.  A lesson that Japan has taught the united states is that there is a possibility of change, that change can be made.  It will take time to train teachers in this way to benefit the students, it is far from an overnight process, but it can get done. The education system in the united states needs to change, we need to improve our math skills and the way math is being taught. It is only going to keep hurting students like me who are not strong in math.

” Gender Segregation ” https://www.tolerance.org/magazine/spring-2010/gender-segregation-separate-but-effective

” single Gender in public schools ” https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/single-gender-public-schools-in-5-charts.html

” Coed versus single- sex ed ”  https://www.apa.org/monitor/2011/02/coed.aspx

” Single -sex education: Pros And Cons” http://smhp.psych.ucla.edu/pdfdocs/singleeduc.pdf

” The resurgence of single-sex education ” https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/12/the-resurgence-of-single-sex-education/421560/

” single – sex education  versus coeducation in adolescence ” https://thesanfordschool.asu.edu/acces/evidence-based-answers/single-sex-education-vs-coeducation

Over all this was a well written essay. You are very detailed and while reading this it helped because it played like a movie in my head. I would just look over some of the basics like capitalization, punctuation, and grammar. But besides that it was really well written.

Math, a complex subject that most of us hate doing or aren’t that great at it. While some are good at math, I was never that person. I struggled with math all my life, it also seems like many Americans are bad at math. We’re a culture that makes it okay to be bad at math. But is that okay?

In ” Why do Americans stink at math?” By Elizabeth green. Discusses what most young American students go through. It is not uncommon for students to not do well in math. It is a subject that is popular with many struggling with it.  Within this article, we talk about Akihiko Takahashi in 1978, a college student in Tokyo, and his mission to make math become easier to learn, with different ways of teaching it.

Akihiko Takahashi became an elementary school teacher, but in Japan, he taught college students who aspired to become teachers as well.  He brought teaching to another level, teaching like no one before. He turned his classroom into a laboratory.  He decided to change the way students should study, instead of having them memorize equations and practice problems, just like how we do in American schools now.  He decided to have discussions among the class, and by doing this having the students work out the problems themselves.   I personally would like if math would be taught this way in America. I feel being taught math over the years that we are just given a problem and have to solve it on your own. By doing this I’m not learning the steps and what each of them means to solve problems. Over the next 12 years the Japanese educational system, used this approach when it came to teaching math.  In 1991, at the age of 58, he had an opportunity to teach in America, a school run by Japanese.  He had a desire to be the center of new math.  He started to visit American schools, he would see that Americans had this dream way to teach math but they would fail.

American teachers failed guidance,  were unprepared, they were damaging students more than they were helping them.  A reform to change math but it’s without a good system for helping teachers be able to learn to teach them.  Teachers are doing different types of training constantly to keep up with what’s new and learning it themselves, so how can they teach it? I have experienced this many times. I’ve had teachers tell the class that they learned this new concept and a new way to teach but it never helped any of the students. It only made math 10x harder. I understand trying to educate teachers more that way they can educate us and make our generation better than there’s. Though it is not helping, from experience. I think teachers need to know concepts fully before deciding to teach it. Students know don’t know basic math concepts like how to multiply or divide, use arithmetic and applying it to daily life. Teachers are unprepared, setting the children back in their education.

In countries like Japan, they have a similar approach but their success with it is incredible, while in America maybe we aren’t suited for this just yet. On an average test two-thirds of fourth graders and eighth graders are not skilled in math.  Same goes with on multiple choice test, the same results could not comprehend the question.  Even in our home state of Massachusetts, one of the countries highest performing with math, the average student is two years behind in math, versus in other countries like Japan. The unschooled are more capable of math that’s complex than the students who have been taught it.

In ” Why Japanese students excel in mathematics ” By Walt Garnder discuses how almost all of the American math classes have the same structure and follow the same pattern.  We are focusing on procedures but not that the procedures mean.  Students aren’t able to apply the problem strategy to new problems. I dealt with that constantly with math through the years. American institutions that have charged teachers to learn new procedures in math have shown unable to do it.  If teachers are not getting the right training then they are unable to teach math the right way or understand it themselves.  The training is weak and just leading to inefficient teachers. As a teacher, you have the power in your hands to educate the next generation. It is your job to bring them on the path of success, if you’re failing by teaching them, then what’s your purpose? A lesson that Japan has taught the united states is that there is a possibility of change, that change can be made.  It will take time to train teachers in this way to benefit the students, it is far from an overnight process, but it can get done. The education system in the united states needs to change, we need to improve our math skills and the way math is being taught.

Education has always been something that I’ve been interested in. I was the girl who loved going to school, even at a young age I knew that I wanted  to be a teacher and to make a difference. I had the opportunity to go back to my high school, Bishop Connolly high School, and observe a class.

I visted my old history/ American government teacher, Mr. Vieira.  He is a teacher that is filled with knowledge and wisdom, and his classes for me at least I always enjoyed. I sat in on an American Government honors  class. The class was a large size, around 24 students in it. At least that was a large size a small school.

Every student that walked in looked the same, girls wearing a skirt and a Oxford or a polo. Boys wearing khakis with an Oxford or polo. They all sat down at the desks waiting for the lecture to begin. I wanted to be able to watch the interaction between the students and the teacher. How they act? How involved are they in th lecture? How many are truly paying attention?

For this class you could use your computers / IPads to take notes, since the PowerPoint was online you could follow along that way as well. As the class began most students were listening following along to what he was saying. And when mr. vieira would as a questions students would engage, multiple of them raising there hands. Some students would even debate their answers. It was interesting to watch. Steudntes  sharing  their  knowledge and opinions.

You could tell by watching the debates and the questions being asked / answered that the students and the teacher has a good relationship. Sometimes even cracking a joke. Of course there was those few students who’s eyes were glued to their computer, not paying a single once of attention  or looked like they were even listening to what was going on. But 90% of the class was paying attention and interacting with the teacher.

By sitting in on this class I was able to see how the students interacted with the teacher, how many actually pay attention ,  and how they act. Most of the students interacted with the teacher and it was nice to see how interested and involved they were with this topic. And you could tell they were paying attention when questions were asked and how many would raise they’re hand and debate. Overal,  I think sitting in on this class was a great way to look inside and watch the interactions anxiety relationship between the student and the teacher.