Jamie Peters
Middle School Math District Mentor
Salem Keizer Public Schools
My Why
When you know your why then your what has more impact because you’re working toward your purpose. - Michael Jr.
I teach, by choice. I am a second-career educator, and I chose this profession for reasons other than financial reward or status. I chose this profession because I believe in the power of education and specifically teachers and schools to help all students achieve. I also recognize that we all have seen how just providing a free public education doesn’t result automatically in student achievement. We as educators, parents and politicians, keep holding onto the ideal, but we seem to think that the solution will come in the form of one magic solution. In my first years of mathematics education, I kept searching for the one solution that would help all my students become mathematicians (including my students from groups who were lagging others). After 13 years of working, thinking, collaborating, laughing and learning in a mathematics classroom, I have come to the realization of a few things. First, there is no one magic solution. Second, I do not have the magic solution, but I do believe that I have seen certain factors have a greater impact than others.
I lead because in my experience, there are certain beliefs that result in the greatest mathematical growth, regardless of a group of students’ past performance. I feel that most importantly, students need to believe that they can be successful math students and that they can grow in their mathematical proficiency. There are many ways to achieve this – mindset activities and videos, references to research about growing dendrites in your brain, positive posters and slogans – but most importantly the educator must believe in the ability of every student to learn and grow in math. Slogans are not enough. When I have internalized my belief in all my students, I am able to authentically celebrate growth with my students. Additionally, I have been able to support my students to do challenging work without lowering my expectations. Finally, when I believe in my students’ abilities, they begin to believe in themselves and they begin to engage more, persevere more and problem solve more. All those activities result in mathematical gains that aren’t possible without that belief.
My Philosophy
All students should experience three things every day in math class to maximize growth. Students should have time to think about mathematical ideas without a teacher giving them solutions or procedures that remove their chance to ponder math. Students should talk about math every day. They should get a chance to hear other students’ thinking and justifications, while also sharing their own thinking and then justifying it to others. Lastly, students should have an opportunity to feel good about themselves as a mathematician every day. Each kid deserves a “win”. Teachers should help make invisible wins visible to their students. Lastly, all these things should be occurring in a safe space, where students are free to inquire, make mistakes and be vulnerable without fear of being humiliated.
As we ask our students to engage in math class in a new way, using a problem-based approach, we as teachers must alter our methods of lesson planning and leading classes. This requires teachers to truly be mathematical thinkers themselves. It is not sufficient for a math teacher to know one algorithmic way to solve a mathematical problem. Teachers need to know the “why” of the math, which enables them to link and sequence different students’ ideas into a coherent explanation of a mathematical concept to their class. The challenge is that we will always be stuck in a transition between the “old” and the “new” way as long as teachers who learned the “old” way are teaching. It’s human nature to fall back on what you are comfortable with or what you know. I would argue that we need to focus portions of future professional learning with elementary and middle school math teachers challenging teachers to “do” the math themselves – utilizing non-algorithmic methods. This gives teachers the ability to better understand the mathematics, while also predicting what ideas and questions their students will have. Only through many years of teaching middle school math, have I finally reached the point of understanding the underlying math sufficiently to meet students where they are and guide them to the solution using “their” methodology.