A positive experience during my school years learning mathematics would be how mathematics just seemed to click for me, whereas other subjects did not. The simplistic beauty of logic inherent in math really enticed me to learn more of this subject material, whereas the other subject seemed to be rote memorization. This example is more related to the structure of mathematics rather than a personal experience, but I feel it nevertheless impacted my future decisions. A more personal experience would be when teachers would relate the topic at hand to real-world phenomena, so that I could connect to the idea of it being relevant to my understanding of the world, hence increasing my interest. In addition, integrating technology into mathematics is a big boon, considering the popularity of if today.
The reason I want to become a mathematics teacher is to display this beauty to the youth in Canadian society, so that they too can appreciate the natural allure of the world. As a more personal experience when I was tutoring, being able to guide a student through a problem and them finally understanding the core concept after many efforts is extremely rewarding as an educator, as you feel like you really are making a difference in their life.
I also had teachers who related math topics to real-world issues and decision making. What I didn't have the opportunity to do was to learn the importance of technology, especially the role math plays in technological development and consequently economic progress.
ReplyDeleteI really like the reasons you presented as your motivation to become a teacher, as some of those also intersect with my own attitude towards math teaching.