the math debate

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The Math Debate: To Drill it or To Explore it?”
What interested you in the article?
The article is an interesting literary writing whose topic is debatable but factual to its extent. I was particularly interested in the manner in which the author, an experienced teacher, questioned the status quo in the teaching methods used in mathematics classroom. Mathematics is taught just like the other social subjects thus losing their interesting bits.
Did you like/dislike: agree/disagree with the issues or ideas presented and why or how?
I fully concur with the author’s ideas as presented in the article. Drilling mathematics into the learners is easy, and fast as the mode of application assumes that the learners are blank and they don’t know any other thing. However, this is largely untrue as the learners know more about the environment and that can be used to understand the mathematical phenomena. Additionally, spoon feeding the students with formulas, rules and procedures kills the curiosity and creativity and makes the learners to hate math (Lauritzen, para.4). Lastly, using the drilling method removes the ability for the learners’ to practice what they learn in class such that it is impractical.
Did you learn anything from this article? Did it change your mind, or confirm what you already knew?
Yes, I learnt a lot from this article and I intend to practice it once my long term goal of becoming an educator is achieved. I wish the students to learn in an engaging environment and learn the mathematical concepts that they can apply in their daily lives.

The article changed my mind on how I look at teaching as just relaying the information from books to students. It opened my eyes that there is more to teaching than just reading the answers and showing the way. Leaving the students to explore on their own would be more effective in the future of the learners.
Is this something you would implement in your classroom? Why? Why not?
Yes, this is something we can implement in class. Although it is difficult to fully implement the exploration strategy, we can adopt a partial strategy where the drill method used in class can be explored outside for the learners to explore what the learned in class.
Works Cited
Lauritzen, Bill. “The Math Debate: To Drill It or To Explore It?” Earth360. N.d. Web. 9th December, 2018. <http://www.earth360.com/math_debate.html>