a novel idea. (and yet not new at all).
how did you learn? how did you grasp the concepts that your students struggle to understand and retain today?
my guess. through play. through actually exploring your world. through seeing how materials worked together to create something new.
and yet in the classroom of today we have essentially taken this aspect of learning away from our students. we have told them they must ‘learn’ through reading (but not truly seeing).
we wonder why our students are failing… but maybe we should wonder why we have abandoned a practice that was working.
personally. i believe that my students (at a technical college) need this type of learning. they are caught in an endless cycle of developmental education where they (try to) scrape through in order to finish their programs. they need something different. something that will work. something other than a lecture about how 2+2=4. they need to see this. to understand that they use inequalities everyday (or at least every time they pay for something).
we need to be active. they need to be active. to see the reality of how math is occurring in every facet of their lives. it is time for change.
