October 3 Class Reflection- Working with Fractions

     This week was once again another interesting week in my mathematics education learning. Like other weeks the class would focus on a specific mathematical concept, but would reveal so much more about approaches to teaching math. This week we talked about fractions and what it so important about them. One aspect I believe is important to teach to students is how the concept that they are learning can apply to the real world. When a teacher does this, it reveals to the student the importance of what they are learning which I believes gets students excited about math. For example, since we learned about fractions this week I could use pizza as a demonstration of how fractions work. I could show the students that with the same size pizza you could cut it into smaller pieces, like 1/12, or make large pieces, like ¼. Either way by using this example students can see that the pizza never got smaller, it was simply divided up differently. Another interesting example that an educator could use is with a Hershey’s chocolate bar, as seen in the video below. Here you could have the students interact with the lesson and have something that will get them excited; I know I thoroughly enjoyed being a part of this lesson.

            This week we also got a chance to see how physical manipulatives can assist students in their learning of fractions. We got a chance the use tools like cut paper plates and blocks to show what fractions are, a portion of a whole. From the activities we did with these manipulatives I gained a plethora of ideas about how I can insert these activities into my own placement. Even though I am placed with a grade 7 and 8 class, I believe that some of the principles used in these activities can be transferred to more difficult mathematical concepts. For example, I could use these manipulatives to help my grade 7 students with multiplying and dividing fractions in complex equations. Below is a picture of some of the manipulatives we used.

Here is a fun introduction into fractions that can be used for the lower grades.
Here is a link to a website with some fun activities that can be used to get younger students excited about learning fractions.
http://www.education.com/activity/fractions/

            In addition to learning about methods to teach students about fractions, I got a chance to learn about how to ask effective questions. I believe that asking effective questions is one of the primary responsibilities as a teacher, but the questions must allow for deep thinking and discussion. We learned in class about some of the questioning goals that teachers should look for, such as evoking thinking, questions that allow for many responses, and has a parallel problem that can offer more reflection and discussion. Questions which achieve these goals allow students for deeper thought about what they are learning and makes them ask how it can be applied to their daily lives. Questions are also a helpful method of scaffolding, the idea that you build the student’s knowledge by making the tasks progressively more difficult. With questions you force the student to think more and help them arrive at their own learning on their own with the teacher as a guide. I believe that this type of learning is much more fulfilling for the student than any hints we could provide for them.