Summaries of the Readings This Week

Classroom Discussions Chapter 9:
 This chapter focuses on what makes up a good lesson plan while providing numerous different examples as to how a lesson plan can look or include. Most of the information has already been taught to me like identifying the mathematical goals, anticipating confusion, have questions prepared for discussion, and planning the  implementation (Chapin, 2009). However, I believe that summarizing is something that I have never officially learned and is something that is taken for granted. Summarizing is a useful tool that allows for conclusions to be drawn and shared meaning among students can be developed (Chapin, 2009).

Stein Article:
This article focused on the discourse within that classroom. "Mathematical discourse is the way students represent, think, talk, question, agree, and disagree in the classroom" (Stein, 2001). As I have discussed in previous post, discussion in mathematics has never been apart of my mathematical career. Everything has been lecture based with the numerical answer representing my understanding of the material. It is so important to get children to talk through math together to create a better understanding.

Atkins Article:
Similar to the Stein article regarding communication, Atkins focuses on power of bringing conversation into the classroom. The biggest item that stood out to me was the role of the teacher. Too often teachers are the leaders of the lesson but when discussions are brought into the classroom, the teacher can become a member of the mathematical community (Atkins, 1999).

Kazemi Article:
This was by far my favorite article. I believe that too often math is cut and dry. Throughout my experiences, there is no room for interpretation. However, it is so important to provide students with the flexibility to explore the mathematical world and to create their own arguments. Promoting students to create their own mathematical arguments will eventually foster a stronger classroom discourse (Kazemi, 2001). I loved that this article showed the importance of arguing for it helps students to come up with ideas of their own and to find passion within the material.