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Teaching found me in 1998, when I was lost and searching just like most seniors in high school. After being told by my
guidance counselor that I needed a major, I took an account of what things I liked to do and what was most important to me. One thing that I loved to
do was help other people. I spent countless hours in the Elk Grove High School Writing Center helping students write papers, and all over my junior
high and high school yearbooks you will find comments thanking me for helping with homework, specifically math homework. Then I thought back to the
third grade, when I found a subject a really loved to work in: mathematics. Since then, I have always been inspired and motivated to study mathematics
and its results and applications in the real world. In addition, I'm fairly claustrophobic and don't enjoy being separate from people in little
cubicles all day long. These three things motivated me to pursue a professional career in education.
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Since that decision, I have finally begun to form an educated idea of what it means for me to be a teacher and what grander
goals I have than just teaching math. What I have discovered is a work in progress, and I still have much to learn. One thing Iāve come to realize is
that even though mathematics' greatest strength is it's ability to create abstract representations of real world events, I feel that this tends to be
its greatest hindrance in terms of teaching. Focusing on abstract mathematical thinking was not what the great mathematicians of the past did; most of
their discoveries and ideas where directly motivated by events in the real world that they were studying. Although the emphasis in mathematics is
usually going from the general statement to a more specific situation, I believe it is equally important to see the necessity and value in starting in
a specific situation, developing a potential generalization, and then effectively testing it. This process requires thinking and understanding instead
of rote memorization, and to create a classroom environment where real situations are studied, analyzed, converted into mathematical statements,
solved, and then interpreted in that mathematical setting would be one of the greatest achievements of my life. I want my classroom to be a bastion
for skills that students will use for the rest of their lives. It is the absolute truth that many students will not use the quadratic formula a day
after they leave high school, but it is also the absolute truth that developing and working with the quadratic formula can sharpen and enhance more
generalized skills in students which in turn can help them in situations involving all disciplines. This means that math needs to be the tool in the
classroom, a tool for creating mathematical understanding, not mathematical memory.
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To back up one moment, let me make it clear that there is a time and a place for memorization. Repeating a process
over and over again can be valuable. But if the focus of a math class is on information that a student will forget five minutes after the final exam,
then I would hardly classify the math class as a success, regardless of the grades on the exam. I desire to truly educate my students in a way that
will transcend the boundaries of my classroom, enabling my students to be critical thinkers, being able to deal with dynamic situations and ask the
important questions that guide students through a problem. The focus I want to make is on the students, and not the mathematics. If my focus was on
math, then I may not feel too bad moving on to new topics when my students arenāt ready. Instead, I am deeply interested in how my students are doing
and constantly thinking of ways to help them develop and deep and meaningful understanding of mathematics.
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