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Vlog Ep #10: Involving Parents in Their Children’s Math Education

 

How do you find the parents of your students? Are they helping their children to learn, or are they more of a hindrance?

Some parents can be incredibly difficult to cope with, of course. And sometimes an assertive manner and explaining the boundaries between their opinions and your professional work is called for.

But apart from those difficult parents, I strongly believe that parents should be kept informed about what we are teaching, and generally we should involve them as partners in their children’s education.

 

If you are going through a hard time coping with the parents of your students, please forgive me if my comments are off base or have caused you any offence; that is never my intention.

But if you agree that working with parents is a good thing, do share your tips below on how to achieve this goal.

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Vlog Ep #09: Fake Math and Pseudocontexts

 

What are pseudocontexts, and should K-6 math teachers be concerned about them?

I came across the term in Dan Meyer’s excellent blog, in which he explores better ways of engaging students in learning math, and calls out “fake math” and poor teaching. You should go check out Dan’s work, I find it really challenging and encouraging.

 

As a publisher of educational content for K-6 math, I am deeply concerned about students’ recognition of the importance and the usefulness, the utility of the math they learn.

This means that I am always looking for ways to show students examples of math in real life. But does that mean I have to restrict my examples to ones where someone is asking a specific math question that matches the topic students are learning, or can I ask questions which someone might ask, but probably didn’t?

What do you think? Leave a comment below if you’d like to share your thoughts.

Recent examples of “math in real life contexts” are found in my Where’s the Math? video series, which you can see here. Am I guilty of introducing pseudocontexts?

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Links to other pseudocontexts:

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Vlog Ep #08: Teaching Math Unshackled from Standards and Curriculum Documents

 

Are you getting a little tired of other people interfering in how you teach in your classroom?

I see around the world teachers being put under greater and greater pressure to perform, as if they were mere employees or servants of the state. And I’m over it!

Most politicians have never taught a day in their lives, from what I can tell. How dare they act like teachers should somehow get more motivated to achieve higher results, for the good of the nation?

 

Now, of course the curriculum is important, as I say in the video. But bureaucrats and nit-pickers seem to think that teachers need to stop being so opinionated, and just accept that they are there to do the will of their masters. Arrggghhhh!!! What doctor, engineer or lawyer would accept such treatment?

So let’s stand up for professional autonomy in our classrooms, go out and do an outstandingly excellent job, for our students, their families, and of course our nations.

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