In Erlanger's paper about Benny and the self taught math program, his main point was that it doesn't work and that teachers are necessary to guarantee a certain level of success. Benny was clearly a bright child since he managed to make up math rules that made sense to him and they worked for him about 80% of the time. His teachers didn't notice how much he was struggling because in comparison with the rest of the class, Benny was doing quite well with the program. His teachers had no reason to work individually with him unless he asked for help, and even he thought he was doing well so there was no reason to ask for help.
I think it's ridiculous to think that teaching mathematics principles can be done without the guidance of a real live teacher. If you don't know the correct math rules as a student, and you don't build upon those rules, you will not be able to progress very far. The high school student that I tutor had a very "hands off" math teacher last semester. Now she has a new teacher, and when I come to help her with her homework, most of it is finished ahead of time becomes she's gaining relational understanding at school just because her new teacher is involved with his students.
9 years ago
While i find that it can be really helpful to have a hands on teacher that interacts with the kids I also disagree with you on the fact that learning can't be done without a teacher. For most of my schooling, I had to deal with incompetent teachers and taught myself the majority of the mathematics principles if not all of them. Some students can look at the text book and completely understand.
ReplyDeleteYou wrote your second paragraph well in that the ideas you talk about in it come from the main point that you mentioned in your first paragraph. It was also good that you mentioned an example to support your point.
ReplyDeleteIf I were to write your second paragraph I would just change the topic sentence to include less emotion, but still come across strong and resolute in the idea.
I really liked your topic sentence. It really pulled me into the post. I also really liked your personal experience in dealing with students and how much better they do when have an involved teacher. I could have maybe used more specifics about how and why teachers are important today, and what they do for students.
ReplyDeleteWitnessing first hand is a great way to really understand the need for a teacher. I like your example you used to show that in our classrooms today we need an actual student-teacher relationship. Now I just want to know how the teacher is helping your student obtain this relational understanding. How much is the teacher actually involved with the student? When does the teacher do to correct the previous misunderstandings?
ReplyDeleteYou did a nice job defining the main point of Erlwanger's article.
ReplyDeleteI would say what "it" is in your first sentence. I would also go into more details of why Benny's conceptions were bad. Reading your first paragraph, it sounds like Benny is doing fine. The paragraph didn't seem to provide much evidence of the main point.