24 days til Christmas and our first icy cold snap. I spent the day at a Maths course in a theme park. It was all about helping children with different learning styles to access Maths. This is a big one for me as I am very good at learning stuff by listening, reading, writing down and figuring it out through logic and practice. Therefore, that is how I teach.
This is OK for the kids who learn like I do but there are plenty who learn differently - they are much more visual or kinasthetic - they need to access through seeing and/or doing. The lecturer was very geeky but I thought very good and gave us some very good ways to teach a little differently. We used interlocking cubes, straws, pipe cleaners, an abacus, loads of different stuff that we can use in the classroom. I really enjoyed it and it gave me some ideas BUT it's still going to be hard for me because I'm still at the stage when, if I explain something clearly, simply and logically, and the child still doesn't get it, I think there's something wrong with THEM.
