April Journal- Teaching Children Mathematics

Treahy, D., & Gurganus, S. (2010). Teaching Children Mathematics. Models for Special Needs Students, 16(8), 484.

Summary

The journal started off by talking about co teaching. Co teaching can be used to describe when the special education teacher and the general education teacher work together and share the responsibility for planning. When teaching math teachers should teach with more hands on strategies. This way when co teaching there will be a lot more flexibility. Also, a lot of students who have disabilities learn better when they use models and thinking aloud strategies. The one teach one assist method was than introduced. This is when one teacher is teaching the class a hands on strategy and the other teacher circulates around the classroom and assists the students. This allows for teachers to observe early on if children have problems with simple mathematical concepts. This can relate to hurting them later on because the things they are learning are the fundamentals of all mathematics. The authors also discussed parallel structure. This is when both the general education teacher and the special education teacher teach the same topic, however the special education teacher works with small groups. The journal article ended with elements for successfully co-teaching mathematics. These included always planning, constantly communicating with the co teacher, and also monitoring your students.

Evaluation

This journal article was extremely interesting. Especially because I am going to be a special education teacher one day. It really opened my eyes up to the world of math. I realized that before I start teaching I should try to brush up on mathematical abilities. The article stated that a lot of times the special education teacher did not know the mathematics topics very well, and sometimes even taught the students wrong. I really enjoyed learning the different strategies for co teaching in the journal article. The parallel structure seemed like a good strategy so that as a special education teacher I can work with a small group of students on the same thing that the rest of the class is working on. The method I enjoyed the most was the one teach one assist method. I liked this method because in this one teacher is teaching while the other is walking around and assisting the students. This is beneficial because it allows for one of the teachers to make sure all students are understanding the topics being presented. They can look for students who may need some challenges who are gifted while at the same time looking for students who may need extra help. Overall this was a very beneficial article, especially because I will be a special education teacher.