assignment 2. (Connecting School and Home Experiences):

The question, " what influenced you to think what you now think?" about anything, is a very interesting question. So, to now be asked to think about an experience that shaped the way I think about my current discipline, takes me back; throughout memories of my entire life. I should mention that my discipline is Math/Stats. One experience that I had with math has greatly affected the way that I conceptualize math in general. As a child I grew up  spending time in my grandpa's shop. He was a carpenter, and a very efficient and precise one at that. In fact, he was well know for his precision; actually having some of his work put in a museum. The obvious part of this influence is with measurements, fractions, and angles. But, for me, the biggest influence was that it got me asking, how could I? or why? or what if? or how does that relate to that? Lets call those the Necessary Questions.  I understand that it might be hard to understand why theses questions would be begged from working in the shop, it is hard to explain. To build something original or complex, you have to build it in your mind and then on paper first; before anything else. I always had ideas but, in some cases, they couldn't be done because of limits of the machinery or of the wood itself; so I had ask and answer each of the questions mentioned above. Each time I asked a question, Math was the test, and Math was the answer. I think that every experience you have in life will affect your way of thinking or understanding. This experience was of great impact to me in life, and especially in school. In school, this gave me an advantage. This experience led me into asking all of those questions mentioned above, about everything. It also, in many ways, gave me a way to relate and visualize what I was learning. But foremost, it got me to be engaged and to ask higher order questions about what I was doing. This will no doubt influence my teaching in the future and in many ways. Comparing this to my English classes, where nothing really got me to ask those questions, there was a profound difference, which still exists today. Every teach seems to want to teach a lesson that can relate to their students. That is important, but only in gaining temporary focus; unless it is done in the correct way. For example, using basketball to show relationships of angles might get a child's interests for a moment, but what happens after that. Those children, when they play basket ball in the future, will not be asking those Necessary Questions. The correct way to relate is by relating the subject to something that begs those Necessary Questions about that subject. So when asked how can I draw from my students background experiences in my discipline to connect them to the State and National standards, I have a clear answer. Find out what in there background is already begging those Necessary Questions and push them, as much as I can, into answering those questions.