Blog 3

My Wish list

There are tons of thing that I wish my students had before they came to me. I'm only going to say a couple. One, I wish they were taught to read directions. Now, I'm not saying that other teachers aren't teaching it, because I fully believe that they are teaching it. I'm just saying that the students are not doing it. So many issues would be solved if they would just read the directions. Then, there is the second necessary step, they need to think about what they have been taught and apply it to the question they just read. I can sight so many examples of times that students have asked a question to me and my response is, "Did you read the question?" or "read the question aloud to me". Then, I spark their memory by saying the question again. I'm not changing the wording or anything. Just saying it again. Then, they get it. They just never take the two seconds to read the question and then think about what they know.

I guess this all boils down to problem solving skills. These kids have little to no problem solving skills when it comes to normal educational (tested) standards. These kids can solve problems when they aren't in school (not always well but they do solve problems), they just never apply this to school. I wish they would apply these skills to school. Our job as a teacher is to teach them how to apply those skills. I feel in my situation though, I learned the problem solving skills in school and then I learned how to apply those skills outside of school, and I find that I am working to do it the opposite way.

I feel that if students came to me with the knowledge of how to apply their problem solving skills to the classroom and had average reading comprehension, then I could teach them the math that they need for this grade.