Blog Post #6

The Networked Student: Wendy Drexler

"Why does the networked student even need a teacher?" 

I understand all the information given to me about the networked student, but have many questions about it. How am I suppose to relate this to math (being a future math educator)? How will I engage my students in the learning process for technology? Where do I draw the line of teaching the material vs my students learning this on their own?

Being in math education, I see very few ways around the standard lecture and homework routine. I'm not suggesting this is the only way forever and always, but I'm suggesting that by knowing what the material is about and producing the same process and solutions time after time, we can eventually understand the pattern given to us and the material becomes easier to recognize and solve. With network learning, I've helped myself produce a learning style that fit for me, which is:

1. Read some material about the upcoming topic before class. ANY material.
2. Take legible notes so that you and others can read them.
3. Do the homework based on notes, books, and the internet.
4. Make marginal notes of exceptions that comes from homework problems.
5. Questions are made (respectively):
1. In class currently
2. In the tutoring lab
3. In class, the following period
4. During professor's office hours.

Ample trial and error to see which study habits worked best for me, how I learned, and where to cherry pick my information was a grand help to me becoming a great student. This is something I would like to pass on with network learning. Network learning can become a great tool for all sorts of ideas, learning tools, and resources for students and I wouldn't want to deprive them of this. There are multitudes of math websites like Khan Academy, YouTube, and Alpha Wolfram that show math's process in different learning styles. Perhaps these sites will even facilitate better communication for what I couldn't!

 As for teaching the material vs my students learning on their own, I think this would be a great discussion I could have with my class about good, safe, and educationally correct resources I'd recommend. As long as the outside resources don't contradict my teachings (assuming I'm correct), I could even encourage outside studying of materials ahead of time or materials that are apart of "fun math" like the Fibonacci Sequence!