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Student Teaching Reflections
During the past ten weeks of student teaching I have used several different types of instruction and have found some that work and others that did not accomplish what I expected them to. One area that I experimented a lot with was group activities and hands-on learning. We have been taught that many students learn best when they can visualize and touch what they are learning. Both activities that were videotaped during my student teaching involved hands-on activities to enhance a topic that we had been talking about. The outcomes for each varied greatly. The college geometry classes felt that the activity helped them with visualization, while the technical geometry classes still could not grasp the concept. There may be several reasons for this, but it will not stop me from using cooperative learning in my classroom.
One of the first topics I taught during my student teaching was polygons, in the college geometry classes. They had to be able to identify several different polygons and use the properties. Many students were having trouble visualizing the differences between certain polygons, such as trapezoids and parallelograms. They knew the definitions, but when asked to draw them some students had trouble. The activity that I used, and videotaped, to help them visualize the different polygons was the dollar bill folding activity. The students were given a copy of a dollar bill and a list of different polygons. They were asked to fold the dollar into all of the polygons using the definitions. Many students struggled with several of them, but finally figured it out and were able to tell the difference between polygons more easily. At one point on the video tape I am discussing how many sides a pentagon has with one group because they did not know and were trying to create one. A few of the group members knew it was five sides, but I kept asking until the last group member told me so I knew everyone understood. Since that time, that particular student has always remembered that a pentagon has five sides. Then at the end of the period there was a group that was struggling with some of the last polygons. I spent some extra time with them encouraging them, but allowing them to figure it out on their own. Finally they figured them out and were excited that they had done it on their own. I had several students come up to me later and say that the activity helped them see the differences and now they did not become confused. I also saw from questions and discussions throughout the chapter that the students were no longer struggling with the definitions of different polygons.
The results of a group activity in technical geometry were not as promising. I videotaped an activity towards the end of my student teaching that dealt with the topic of circles and Pi. We were learning about the area and circumference of circles and most students had used Pi previously, but did not realize it was the ratio of circumference to diameter of a circle. In order to help my students see Pi as a ratio rather then just the number 3.14 I used a cooperative learning activity. The activity consisted of ten stations, which had a circular object, a tape measure, and a calculator. The students were asked to measure the circumference and diameter of each object and then find the ratio of circumference to diameter. The answer should come out very close to Pi. If it did not then they were to re-measure until they got closer. All of the students completed the activity and most got ratios very close to Pi. As was expected a few students left their answers either very large or very small. There was not an opportunity to discuss the activity at the end of that class period, but the next day we discussed their results. The first thing I asked was what was the ratio for Pi that we used in the activity. To my surprise only a few students knew the answer. Most of them did not know what it was anymore and answered 3.14. Before the activity was had discussed where the ratio came from using C=d(Pi). I refreshed their memories after the activity and students still had trouble remembering it. I felt that the activity did not accomplish what it was supposed to and just wasted time. Since it did not help them remember the ratio I could have just mentioned it and gave them some problems using it for homework and moved on. There are several reasons why this activity did not work. First it could have been the group of students. Many of these students have given up trying in the class or are suffering from spring fever. No matter what we do they do not seem to put any effort into it. Secondly, the day was very hectic and did not allow for a lot of discussion during the activity. Some students were trying to finish a quiz at the beginning of the period so I was trying to keep an eye on them while others were starting the activity. Then at the end of the period some students had finished while others were still working. This was very evident in the video when I was trying to talk to some students about the activity and others were talking about other things or doing their homework. These students need more structure then what was given. I would not discount this activity until I had tried it with different students. Each year is different and the activity may be successful with different students.
Following my student teaching experience I feel that hands-on activities can be beneficial if the students actively participate and need the help of visualization. The dollar bill activity really helped the college geometry classes with visualization, while the Pi activity did not help the technical geometry classes with understanding the Pi ratio. Other hands-on activities did help the technical geometry classes, such as when they did the dollar bill activity and some activities did not help the college geometry class, such as working on geometric means in small groups. I have learned that while some activities may help one class, it may not work with others. It all depends on the students and the class's situation.