Here’s ‘Heathen Mom’ from http://www.heathenhomeschoolers.com
After reading your blog some more, am I right in assuming you haven’t gotten to algebra yet in your teaching experience? (your kids are pretty young)
I was a classroom teacher in the past. I have taught prealgebra. I have also taught stats.
I am interested in stressing to parents that algebra doesn’t have to be something to fear. Algebra concepts are taught in elem level math.
Oh that’s great! Are you framing your elementary math lessons with a longview towards algebra? If so… how?
I am framing our elementary math lessons with a longview towards algebra. Algebra I will be taken by my children in eighth grade. The plan for their high school math program is for geometry, algebra II, trig/calc and college algebra (dual credit). Their math program will be very similar to what both my husband and I did in high school.
My children are currently in third grade and preschool. I use math terms (variable, distributive property, etc) in math lessons. I think it is often the algebra terminology that frightens students from the subject.
Children do algebra concepts beginning in kindergarten, but most parents and teachers don’t point that out to the children. My son (third grade) loves to tell people that he does algebra. He knows that 47 - ___ = 35 is the same thing as 47 - x = 35. I think that by showing children at a young age that they can in fact do algebra, you will create children far more comfortable with the concepts once they get to the course.
How do you handle a student who gets a little too excited about the subject and becomes disruptive? Maybe a little disruption is fine?
A little disruption is fine. The trick is to not let the student take over the class. It’s important to get some other students involved. Ask other students for their input, or get them into small groups with an assignment to discuss an aspect of the subject, and then get back into a larger group to revisit, and then the class is more focused.
Say, the subject is media literacy. I would teach a class on sports, and ask them to watch a sports game at home and report how many advertisements there are on the field, and in the stands, and on hats and such. You know, not commercials, product placement. They come back, and most kids have done it, and are sort of interested, but a few really paid attention and take over. I would break them into small groups, have them make a list of the advertisers according to product, and bring them back together. So each small group has to report, and it is less likely for one or two students to take over.
There are other ways, it depends on the subject.
-Lynn from Alabama
Here’s Erika from Florida discussing practice and overcoming a topic’s bad reputation.
Do you give practice problems every night?
I do give practice problems almost every night. I think it’s one of the most important things to do, because math, especially algebra, isn’t something you can learn by just looking at it or memorizing the steps. To truly understand how to solve any given problem, you have to practice it.
Have you stumbled upon any tips for teaching algebra from your experience in the classroom?
Keep a track of how long it took you to teach each subject, and what specifically the students had trouble with. It really helps for when you’re trying to pace out the course if you’re teaching it again in the future.
Which topic in algebra is the hardest to teach? How do you deal with that?
If you’re “lucky” enough to be teaching trigonometry, it’s definitely the hardest to tackle. Not because it’s a difficult topic, but because the students most likely already have a negative view about it, and it’s hard to get over that first barrier. Taking it really slow and relating it to previous topics, especially ones they liked, is the best way I know to push through that barrier and to get the students interested in trig.
To start things off here’s Anonymous from California.
Do you try to get into a certain mindset before starting an algebra class?
I try to bring an interesting fact from science or a joke or a personal story
to start the class with. That helps to draw the students away from thier
conversations and to focus them on me and the class as a whole. The students
are ninth graders and the class is a requirement for them so adding a little
fun and interest to the class helps.
I will have reviewed their homework and will have a list of the kinds of
mistakes they are making. Often the mistakes are because they did not learn
prior material correctly or sometimes they get new material confused with old
material. If I am introducing new material then I try to predict and cut-off
in advance misconceptions and common mistakes.
The students are accustomed to starting work on a warm-up problem at the
beginning of class. If the mistakes or issues can be dealt with from the
warm-up problem I will use it. Otherwise after going over the warm-up problem
I will try to explain the mistakes and misconceptions that I had been
witnessing in the student work.
Being a student teacher, I am being observed by a senior teacher. She can be
pretty critical of my techniques and performance, so my main worries are with
how she will view my performance. She does not accept as much conversation in
the class as I might so I have to make an extra point to keep the students on
task, quiet and focused. Also she does not like more than two or three
minutes of class time spent on jokes and off topic subjects. I have to edit
my connection time to this short amount.
Do you have an example of a common mistake or misconception you try to cut-off in advance?
Quite a few of the students did not realize that when a group of variables
and numbers are being raised to a power the parentheses in the exponential
expression show the student which factors the exponent will be applied to.
Also if there is no parenthese that means that the exponent only applies to
the thing that it is superfixed above.
Some students do not think about what makes an equation an equation and not
an expression. After learning how to use completing the square to solve
quadratic equations some of them try to use completing the square to factor
rational expressions with quadratics. They should be using a diamond and box
routine to factor the quadratics because without the equal sign there is no
advantage adding numbers to be able to complete a square on a binomial.
So before the unit on completing the square I ask some students for the
difference between equations and expressions.
