My thoughts on what do students "read" in my content area, math? I apologize to my group that this Yodio is 3 seconds over the 2 minute limit. I must have taken too long of a breath, because it had timed out at 2 minutes when I practiced it.
Jody
I thought it was interesting that we both pointed out the fact that reading is an extremely important part of understanding math problems. I think you emphasized some good points regarding being able to understand symbols and words that one may find in math problems, but not in everyday conversation. All too often, teachers don't think of reading and math as having a correlation, but then they can't understand why students don't do the problems correctly. By simply asking a student to read the directions to a math problem will quickly allow a teacher to understand why solving that problem may be so difficult for the student.
I like your example of introducing the symbol for standard deviation to the students and that they might be able to memorize and repeat a definition back to the teacher, but they wouldn't really know what it means. This is such an important concept for us all to remember as teachers. We need to analyze the tasks we asks our students to do for their ability to support the meaning making process. We need to ask ourselves if the students are simply parroting back our words to us or are they actually understanding the concepts?
My question is kind of for everyone teaching every subject. What kind of reading can we provide the students that will keep their attention and keep them motivated to want to learn these math formulas? If we can keep the information relevant and interesting to them, won't this keep from just "parroting" it back to us?
You are spot on about needing good reading skills to fully understand math. Not only understanding what the symbols translate to in English, but in solving word problems. I love word problems because they really force the learner to THINK, not only about the mathematics involved in solving he problem, but how to visualize and set up the problem in the first place. Hmmm, "visualize", was that one of the words we chose that describes reading from last weeks assignment? I'm pretty sure it was :)
Jody,
ReplyDeleteI thought it was interesting that we both pointed out the fact that reading is an extremely important part of understanding math problems. I think you emphasized some good points regarding being able to understand symbols and words that one may find in math problems, but not in everyday conversation. All too often, teachers don't think of reading and math as having a correlation, but then they can't understand why students don't do the problems correctly. By simply asking a student to read the directions to a math problem will quickly allow a teacher to understand why solving that problem may be so difficult for the student.
Melissa
I like your example of introducing the symbol for standard deviation to the students and that they might be able to memorize and repeat a definition back to the teacher, but they wouldn't really know what it means. This is such an important concept for us all to remember as teachers. We need to analyze the tasks we asks our students to do for their ability to support the meaning making process. We need to ask ourselves if the students are simply parroting back our words to us or are they actually understanding the concepts?
ReplyDeleteMy question is kind of for everyone teaching every subject. What kind of reading can we provide the students that will keep their attention and keep them motivated to want to learn these math formulas? If we can keep the information relevant and interesting to them, won't this keep from just "parroting" it back to us?
ReplyDeleteYou are spot on about needing good reading skills to fully understand math. Not only understanding what the symbols translate to in English, but in solving word problems. I love word problems because they really force the learner to THINK, not only about the mathematics involved in solving he problem, but how to visualize and set up the problem in the first place. Hmmm, "visualize", was that one of the words we chose that describes reading from last weeks assignment? I'm pretty sure it was :)
ReplyDelete