Challenging Students

This week I observed Mr. M teaching an hour and a half probability and statistics class full of seniors. For the first 45 minutes of the class, he had the students do a "word wall" in which he split the students into pairs and had each pair write a word and its definition on a paper and put it up on the wall. One student remarked that it was a "middle school project" and it was obvious that the students thought it was a little silly. After a 15 minute fire drill, we returned to the class and Mr. M wrote a formula on the board. He then gave the students the remaining 30 minutes of the class to work on three plug-and-chug problems.

Overall, I was very interested and discouraged that a teacher who has been in the profession for so long planned this class in this way. I have read articles and heard about schools that have high school students color pictures--because the school believes they are not capable of more--but I was very sad to find an assignment for students that is only a few steps above that. I could tell that the students were not challenged. As a result they put minimal effort into the word wall and many students did not even start the problems that were assigned. This taught me a valuable lesson: teachers must challenge students and provide them with tasks that are age appropriate. This is also something we have discussed in class, but I really saw that it is really important through this instance at school.

If I were teaching this lesson, I would have made up some kind of game (or better yet, have the students make some kind of game) to review the vocabulary and discuss its meaning. I then would have had the students match symbols with the definitions and explain a way to remember what each means. Then, I would have given the students the formula and had them explain to me why it worked. I would then have students come to the front of the class to work through word problems for the entire class, explaining how they went about each step. I think that would be a more challenging adaptation of the current activity. When I am a teacher, I will make sure I challenge my students.