Reflection of Chapter 1

            As a person who struggled with Math my whole life, I found it a chore to even start doing this assignment. However, I saw this sentence in the textbook and it made me realise a few things. The sentence was, 'Those who understand and can do mathematics will have significantly enhanced opportunities and options for shaping their futures' (NCTM, 2000). The first thing I realised was that even though I struggled with Math, I never did badly during my examinations or during daily assignments because I found that once I saw the rationale behind a concept, I could start to do things on my own. The second thing I realised was that since I am in the field of giving opportunities and preparing children to face the world, I would really want them to have, like what the sentence says, enhanced opportunities and options for shaping their futures.

            The text states that teacher's knowledge of Mathematics and how students learn Mathematics are important tools that can be acquired to be an effective teacher of Mathematics. I strongly agree with this because if the teacher had a shallow knowledge of Mathematics and when the teacher is not aware on how the children in the classroom learn, then no learning will be done. Wrong information will be taught and there would be a high chance that the children will be disengaged from the lesson within minutes. I feel that presently, given the national standards and curriculum guides that us teachers have to follow, we cannot afford to have the children not being engaged during Math lessons. Hence, I hope to learn to be a better Math teacher during the course. 

          From this chapter, I feel that I appreciated the 'Principle and Standards for School Mathematics' part in the textbook the most. This is because I could use it as a reminder for myself on how I should be as a teacher. My centre practices a Science-based curriculum and the curriculum is also very much inclined towards literacy. Hence, I would like to know how I could tune these principles and standards to fit the Math aspect of my teaching. Honestly, I follow whatever that is given to me by the curriculum department very strictly and I realise that the Math curriculum that the children are going through now is very different from the Math curriculum that I went through in Kindergarten. The biggest challenge for me now, I feel, is that I have to overcome what I previously know about teaching Math and to make myself focus on 'mathematical thinking and reasoning (NCTM, 2009)' rather than just spoon feeding answers.