Faced with trying to remember what my experience with mathematics was like in primary/elementary, I am hit with the realization of how long ago that really was! I started kindergarten in 1996 - 18 years ago. Although that seems like a really long time, I have a few memories of learning mathematics and how I was taught.
In my elementary school, I remember that some classrooms were more "decorated" with math paraphernalia than other classrooms. I suppose it depended on the preferences of the teacher. In my grade four classroom, my teacher, Mrs. Howse, had a great amount of enthusiasm for math and there were math posters throughout the room - ones that had to do with counting money, 100s charts, multiplication patterns and so on. I remember the textbooks we had for math in the higher grades, and in the primary grades, we had these booklets with pages of math problems stapled together, and the only thing I can really remember about them was that the pages were really soft and if you made more than 1 mistake, you'd erase a hole into your page! My memories of actually learning math are very vague, unfortunately.
My worst memory about mathematics was in grade 3. Mrs. Barfitt would call on each of us individually and ask us one of the multiplication tables. This used to cause me a lot of anxiety because I had a really hard time memorizing the tables, especially the 6, 7 and 8 tables. To help me, my mom wrote out the times tables that I was struggling with and taped them around my room on the walls, so that I could examine them as I was going to sleep at night. It definitely helped! But I know that this affected my confidence in math. Even now, I often second guess myself when it comes to mental math. I often have to double-check things on a calculator when giving change to my tables at work, even though I know I was right the first time. I'm very paranoid about making a silly mistake and not giving the correct change!
In elementary school, although I struggled with the multiplication tables, I never considered myself "not good" at math. Well, at least not in elementary school. I had to have my cousin tutor me in grade 9 and even though I was in advanced math in high school, my boyfriend at the time had to help me with it fairly regularly. In my mind I was a "smart" kid and I never wanted to sell myself short by doing the regular math when I knew I could get through the advanced math with a bit of work. But from kindergarten to grade 6, I aced every report card, and classmates often looked to me for help with many things, including math.
As I mentioned, my experience with mathematics in high school was not quite as pleasant. I was lucky enough to have John O'Reilley as my advanced math teacher in grade 12, but within a month of school starting he left the school to dedicate all his time to his MathReviews business. The replacement teacher was not as effective, but I know that I would have struggled no matter what. My physics teacher, whom despite his sarcastic and "suck it up, buttercup" attitude is one of the best and most influential teachers I have ever had, once called me a "math weenie" because I lost points on my quizzes due to several simple math mistakes, several times.
With John O'Reilley's MathReviews help, I managed to do really well on my math placement test for university. But as I said, I was not overly confident in my math abilities, so I decided to start with Math 1090. My prof taught the very basics of the concepts which I did fine with, but the final was made up by the other professors who taught more complicated concepts....needless to say going into that exam with a 92% was the only thing that saved me from failing the course altogether. The following semester I took Math 1000 and learned it by memorizing the types of problems I was expected to answer, with the help of my ex-boyfriend and John O'Reilley. I didn't really understand what I was doing first nor last, but I finished that course with a 91% which, for me, was something of which I could be proud.
There are some out-of-classroom occasions on which I notice using mathematics. I grew up learning music, and I remember noticing how much math has to do with music theory. It has a lot to do with counting. Figuring out intervals and time signatures has a lot to do with math. I notice that I use math when I'm baking, in terms of using measurements. When I work out at the gym, I calculate how many calories I can burn in a minute and set a goal for myself, therefore I know how long I need to spend on the treadmill. This brings me to telling time, a type of math which we all do every single day and don't even realize it. The most obvious, though, would be when shopping or purchasing something, or changing up money.
Today, I take comfort in the fact that the most complicated math I will ever have to do anymore in my life is that at the grade 6 level! It was never my favourite subject and it still causes me a bit of anxiety if I ever have to really use it. Having said that, I do hope that my attitude towards math will improve throughout this course as I realize how many ways in which it can be used and applied, and how important it is for children to have a good mathematics experience. I don't think I had the best experience with math growing up and looking back, I think it left me with a natural aversion to it and I do not want that to be obvious to my students. If I can eliminate that altogether, that would be the most ideal thing for me! I know that I will have many math resources around my classroom, and I will most certainly not be making my students answer multiplication tables on the spot! Math should not create anxiety in students like it did for me, and I hope to be the type of math teacher that produces confident mathematicians in my classroom!
No comments:
Post a Comment