How would have been, for you, the perfect math or physics lesson in school? Just asking, because i'm gonna be a math and physics teacher soon and want to get some inspiration other than the somehow pretty strange didactics stuff they teach in university. Thanks for your thoughts!
Sorry for my english, it's not my native language.
Oh, sorry: highschool level
For me, I think the most important thing is to always teach some level of understanding and motivation. In math, prove stuff! Don't just teach a technique to solve a textbook problem without explaining why and how it works. Same in Physics. Try to derive everything that you can, don't just throw random equations at them. We make everyone learn these subjects not so that they can find the sin(30) or so they can find the velocity of a falling mass. We teach to help everyone practice their ability to reason, and understand abstract ideas. If you take out the beautiful parts, it's worse than useless, and it's not even fun to learn about. Further, it's absolutely terrible preparation for anyone who actually wants to pursue these subjects after high school.
I would tell the students about interesting problems in the fields of mathematics and physics today. Talk to them about how there is no proof of Goldbach's conjecture or how recently Fermat's Last Theorem was proved.
>>7749346
Do you want to keep them interested, teach correct stuff, or have the feeling you make progress and get through the curriculum?
choose one
>>7749355
This. Fucking this.
I've had a lot of teachers who never explained how shit works and now i'm lost in everything my physics teacher is teaching me
>>7749346
OP I hope you're not teaching in the states, because if your English is rough prepare for a shit storm.
>>7749346
Begin introducing real world problems and let there be discussion to find a solution. Present the math concept and formulation and give exercises to stiffen the knowledge.
End with experiments and real world applications.
For instance: Pythagorean Theorem
Begin by asking what is the path that takes more time to make (From a triangle supose that hypotenuse is one path and the two other sides for the other path)
They will discuss and conclude that the hypotenuse takes the least because the sum of the other two is greater than its value.
Present the concept behind the theorem.
Give exercises to let them sink the theorem
Present the challenge to build a Triangle with Squares attached to them that can be filled with water so that the equation c^2+c^2=h^2 can be "seen" (it's a nice thing to show how the theorem works) or any other project.
Show real life application, like getting the height of buildings (with the help of trigonometry) and stuff like that
>>7749346
You should try to avoid spending the whole class on a lecture.
>>7749365
No, i'm from Germany, so my english shouldn't be any problem ;)
@all: thanks for your input, always pleased to hear more! Most importan for me: how would YOU have wished the lessons should have been. My time in school is already 12 years away (worked somewhere else), so it's a little bit hard to remember.
>>7749401
You need to engage your students. Don't think about trying to get them to like you or respect you. Just make every class interesting and get them involved and they will like and respect you because you actually help them learn. Most people don't learn from listening to lectures. Young people have crappy attention spans, so you need to get them involved. Encourage them to explore how to solve problems before you tell them how to. This gives them a sense of satisfaction if they figure it out, and will make them want to learn more. Encourage them to ask questions.
>>7749346
The two core things I'd suggest is
1) Visualization. Equations on a blackboard don't really mean much to kids. Find ways to show exactly what's happening in a visual fashion and how changing variables affects the result. If you've never watched the "Minute Physics" videos on YouTube or the "Mechanical Universe" DVDs some of their examples work very well.
2) Application. This is much harder, since most high school graduates go on to jobs where math and physics will not play much of a role in their lives. If you want them to remember at least the core things, show them how they relate to their lives. For example, had a co-worker ask me about whether or not a power supply would work; he didn't know the relationship between volts, amperes, and watts. Another example is spreadsheets: many people don't get right results because they've forgotten their algebra.
>>7749346
When teaching calculus, let the students work towards a proof of whatever it is you're working on. Let them work through derivatives and integrals. If you're teaching algebra, guide them through the process of making generalizations in the same way you would guide them towards a proof
If you're teaching physics, set up practical exams of the lessons. Say you're teaching kinematics, then set up a test where you have to get a ball dropped into a small car that's traveling on the floor at x m/sec. They have exactly 3 tries to get it in and before that, they have to show calculations that tell them when to drop the ball. Note that this isn't an experiment with a journal entry. It's just them showing work and applying that work to something practical
use animations or animated gifs to teach
Cant stress this enough!
pic related, movement cant help imagine abstract problems
>>7749541
That pic being animated adds literally nothing.
