Ashley Tam's EDCP 342 Blog

I think mathematics can be connected with social and environmental justice. Numbers are part of every day life and no matter what context we consider, math always finds a way of becoming present. However, I feel this can easily become a game designed to find as many different things to calculate as possible. Essentially any problem can be made into a math problem if you try hard enough. This somewhat reminded me of a picture book I read as a child, Math Curse. The book follows a student who is cursed by having everything in their life turn into a math problem, whether its counting slices of bread for breakfast or catching the school bus on time. I think math exists in politics, environmental justice and social justice because of this fact, numbers are everywhere. However, just because we can calculate our way through social justice, doesn't mean we will fight injustices using math. I think it is definitely a good way of building awareness and connecting mathematics to something stu...

If I were to teach this lesson again, I would still do a no-bake recipe and focus on teaching functions of ingredients and how one can alter the recipe or customize it to their own preference, but I would change the way we prepared the energy bites. We didn't have enough time to roll the bites into balls and it was difficult to do so without chilling them first, so I would maybe find an alternate recipe that didn't require chilling or I would tell students future steps, without having to actually perform them in class. Since the main point of the lesson was to learn about how recipes work, the types of ingredients and how alterations might work, the chilling and eating part could be adapted any way necessary to shorten the activity without hindering the lesson.

EDCP 342 Microteaching Lesson Plan Subject: Baking Skill Level: Beginner Date: Wednesday October 18, 2017 Duration: 10 minutes Lesson Overview Students will learn what a recipe is and how to read and follow it. Students will learn to make no-bake protein bites and what it means to be “no-bake” and the benefits to such a recipe as well as the function of various ingredients including binding, base, flavor, sweetener and nutrition. They will also learn how to vary a recipe through ingredient substitution, addition or removal in order to obtain a customized taste. Class Profile 4-5 students Big Idea(s) No-bake protein bites can be a quick, healthy snack which all can enjoy. Curriculum Competencies (Student’s will be able to…) ·          Read and follow a recipe ·          Measure ingredients, le...

One thing that made me stop in this article was the discussion about how math learning was only accelerated when competition of countries became a factor. I knew that once the Soviet Union successfully sent Sputnik into space in 1957 the United States went into a frenzy trying to catch up to Russians and "beat them". Space exploration became a competition between countries. Although it was logical to accelerate math education for the greater good of society and research in hopes that the next scientific genius would emerge from this generation of accelerated math learners, but it frustrated me that the government viewed children and students as a tool which they could use and shape to their liking. I think giving students a greater math education is an amazing privilege and honour, however I hated that it took something like world competition to encourage the government to place such a vital subject on the forefront of education. I think it also bothered me that the intention...

There were a few things that made me stop in this article. I was very curious about Jackson's perspective that children must "learn to delay their gratification" and even if a child has the right answer they must learn to share gratification with other members of the class. This whole idea got under my skin a little. I don't like that students are taught to accept suppression. I also felt like it sent a bad message that students shouldn't expect to have their voices heard all the time. I do agree that students should give others the chance to speak and answer, but I don't agree that students should accept deprivation of gratification. I think as teachers it is our job to help students gain gratification in their own ways. Even if I had a class of 30 students and it was impossible to give each student public gratification every class, I would find some way to help each student gain individual gratification in different ways. There are other ways to allow studen...

My TPI gave me the highest score for a nurturing teaching perspective and the lowest score for the social reform teaching perspective, while my remaining three: transmission, apprenticeship and developmental teaching perspectives were all equal and my average score. My nurturing perspective was above average and my social reform teaching perspective was below average. I was not surprised that nurturing was my highest score as I value student confidence in learning above all, however I noticed my score in belief and intention were higher than my score for actual action. This was interesting because it made me question what aspects of my teaching would constitute actions versus intention and belief, and since I believe in nurture so much I wondered how I could continue to live this belief truly by acting on it. I think that is what surprised me most about my TPI. Although I have belief and intention to nurture my students, maybe I don't truly understand what it means to be nurturin...