Entrance Slip - Inquiry Topic Possibilities

One area of education that I am interested in exploring is how movement can be used as a teaching tool. I think it is obvious that spending all day sitting can be challenging for students and can make learning more difficult. One way educators address this problem is to have breaks where students can get up and move around. However, I would like to explore ways in which movement can actually be used as a teaching tool in classrooms, specifically in mathematics. Math and dance are two things I have always been passionate about so I am very interested in exploring how the two can converge. I think bringing in movement activities related to areas students are already passionate about (sports, dance, etc.) and linking them to math concepts could also help to get students more interested in the math topics and help connect these abstract ideas to the real world.

Another area of education that I think would be interesting to explore is how to teach to all the different levels of the classroom. Especially in math, it is easy for students to get lost or confused. I think it is very important to work with these students because I know how hard it can be to get caught up, especially in math where you are constantly building on the skills you've learned. However, it is also a problem if the students who learn the material more quickly start to get bored. Math shouldn't seem impossible but it should be challenging. Figuring out how to keep students of all levels engaged definitely presents a challenge.

Finally, I think it may be interesting to explore how to reduce the anxiety many students feel before they even walk into a math classroom. I know math has a reputation as being one of the most difficult high school subjects and a lot of students come into the classroom already anxious and doubting their abilities. Unfortunately, I think this often becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy where a student's anxiety gets in the way of their ability to solve the problems. I would like to study ways that teachers can reduce this anxiety for students and make them feel more confident in their abilities. I believe that a classroom environment where students feel capable and confident is much more conducive to learning than one where they are filled with anxiety and self-doubt.

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