Math will always be more than grades and exams

We know the words algebra, Trigonometry, and hard-to-see geometry can be one of the most painful never-ending experiences during student school life. Students can lose all their interest and energy in solving questions that require only memorization, calculation, and numerical solutions.

Terence Tao divides mathematical education into three stages (Tao, 2018):

• Pre-rigorous, where math is taught informally and intuitively.

• Rigorous, where we work and think much more precisely and formally.

• Post-rigorous, a place to use all the rigorous approaches to understand and refine what we learned in the first stage.

Pre-university students should spend most (if not all) of their time on the first two stages described above. It is where they can learn the language of mathematics, find meaning in the things that happen around them and immerse themselves in fundamental understanding and manipulation of events through the logical, analytical and pattern-oriented approach that math offers.

I design my classes with the goal of our students becoming the center of the classroom and the teacher taking a facilitator role. Also, I use different students-center activities and approaches to achieve this while exercising the school’s 6Cs (see below).

1) Critical & Creative Thinking. 2) Complex Problem Solving 3) Communication

4) Continuous Lifelong Learning 5) Cultural Awareness 6) Community Spirit / Collaboration

Examples of activities and approaches are:

Open-ended questions trigger the students’ wondering minds to find other ways around, to find themselves sharing their ideas, and being convinced by their pairs to see the problem with a fresh view.

These examples are taken from the book "Math with Bad Drawings"

Project-based learning (PBL): I implement PBL to motivate the students to do the practical, exciting math that connects the topics to the student’s real life. They don’t have to memorize formulas and be gurus at proving equations. Still, They use the formulas and concepts to solve real-life problems. At the same time, technological tools help them visually understand and directly interact with the situation on their hands.

“Project-Based Learning engages students in deep and long-lasting learning and inspires them a love of learning and personal connection to their academic experience. (Buck Institute for Education, n.d.).”

Precalculus class. Unit: Trigonometry

G10 students used math to find the best row given the cinema characteristics: Screen size, the distance between rows, inclination angle, etc.

Game-based learning refers to borrowing certain gaming principles and applying them to real-life settings to engage users (Trybus 2015). Imagine your students creating games involving probabilities that will make the whole family play. Ensuring they have advantages without spoiling this fact because they want the players to be interested in it (like the house in the casinos). This is what we did in our Probability unit.

Take a closer look at the pictures below to see what students look like in these math classes.

When you have mastered numbers, you will no longer be reading numbers any more than you read words when reading books. You will be reading meanings.

-Harold Geneen, “Managing”

Let me know your experience trying any of these examples and which others you would add to the list. Email me if you are interested in any project or activity to teach precalculus.

References

Buck Institute for Education. (n.d.). why-project-based-learning. Retrieved from Project-Based Learning Works: https://www.pblworks.org/why-project-based-learning

Orlin, B. (2018). Math with Bad Drawings, Illuminating the ideas that shape our reality. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers.

Tao, T. (2018, December 6). There’s more to mathematics than grades and exams and methods. Retrieved from What's New: https://terrytao.wordpress.com/career-advice/theres-more-to-mathematics-than-grades-and-exams-and-methods/

Trybus, Jessica. 2015. “Game-Based Learning: What it is, Why it Works, and Where it’s Going.” New Media Institute. Accessed April 6. http://www.newmedia.org /game-based-learning--what-it-is-why-it -works-and-where-its-going.html