Final Course Reflection

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Reflection:

I feel that it has been an eye opening experience this term in Educ 450. I really liked how the class was not structured like a typical math classroom. We went outside, we looked at embodying math in the arts and in the world around us and it was just refreshing to see that math can be taught differently than the stand and lecture style that I'm so used to. There something to say about bringing in hands on activities and emotions into the math classroom that is so human in it's nature and so engaging. While I myself and not really a fan of being outdoors, I can see the benefit of the practice of the outdoor classroom and I might try taking my students outside when the topic allows. I feel that doing something like this together builds a sense of community in the classroom which benefits learning as a whole. I feel that in the future, we do even more hands on activities that embody math that would give even more incorporation of other fields into the math classroom, maybe something along the lines of using technology in the math classroom.

Final Project: Motivation into Flow

https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1kq3ZR4OBiHR5Vlq71VYsZkU3RS7uRM6wdYdXN2h0JQE/edit?usp=sharing

Reflection:

I really enjoyed working on this project that allowed me to pursue an area that I was really interested in, in terms of my math career. While I was always interested in math, i noticed the mast majority of people around me where not interested in math. Using my work previously in a school and my observations in the classroom, I noticed that one theme dominated the math classroom. "How can we increase engagement, what is the ultimate form of engagement and how do we as teachers accomplish this?" In my research, experience and conversations with teachers and students, I learned that motivation and engagement is key to gaining the optimal learning outcome. While some students will always perform regardless anything we do as teachers in the classroom, all students benefit from increasing motivation and engagement. I think that in my inquiry 2 project I would like to continue diving more deeply into getting students to be motivated and more deeply into the state of flow. It's truly a fascinating idea of how someone can be so engaged that there is only one goal in mind losing track of all ease. By having students in this state, they can achieve optimal engagement and learning. Things have mostly turned out the way as I expected as it was my experience previously in the classroom, but one idea I had not realized is that this idea of engagement is beneficial for teachers as well. I had not realized how important it was to for students to be engaged for the wellbeing and comfort of the teacher as well as the student. I think I will continue to explore the ideas of engagement and flow and how I can create an involved, engaging classroom that promotes this idea of the state of flow.

Exit Slip Dec 2.

What a wonderfully engaging class. At first when I considered bell ringing in the cathedrals and churches, I never thought that there was so much math behind it. I assumed that someone just went up there and rang the bells however they see fit. I did not know how much organization and structure there actually was to something that sounded very much chaotic at the moment. The idea that the bell ringers could play for hours in order to complete a specific pattern is truly amazing. When it was broken down to combinatorics, that's when it became truly intriguing. The idea that using something so physical and ancient as ringing bells could bring about such advance math concepts and embody them in such a hands on way really fascinated me. I really enjoy music and using a structured pattern in math to connect with the physical act of making music is a great experience that any math student can enjoy.