cvonrenesse's blog

In this blog post Professor von Renesse and her students describe their teaching lab class. If we believe that learning happens best in an inquiry-based way then this applies not only to learning mathematics, but also to learning how to teach mathematics. The idea of this lab class is to create a learning environment in which college students can experiment with teaching in a high school setting and learn for themselves what works best and why.
 
 

In this blog, Phil DeOrsey and Christine von Renesse describe ideas behind student resistance and student buy-in. A great resource is Tolman’s book “Why Students resist learning: A practical model for understanding and helping students”. He uses the Integrated Model of Student Resistance to explain how metacognition, cognitive development, negative classroom experiences, and environmental forces (work, family, culture/racism, disabilities) influence student resistance. It is tempting to think that student behavior only results from our facilitation during class but that is rarely the case.

Think of your class. What do you see? Do you see lethargic faces, students with their heads down, and only your top 10% answering your questions? Or do you see all students engaged; regardless of level? Do you see students talking about math in a productive argument? I can tell you that in just a few months, I have transformed my classroom from the first classroom example to the second.