SEAMC math is an activity where students, including myself, meet every Tuesday after school to practice and learn competition math. I do have some prior knowledge/ experience with this activity, as I was in this activity for the past two years, and have also won several medals in both SEAMC and WMC last year. As math is one of my passion and interest, I’ve chosen to join this activity this year as well, but rather than being a “student” in the activity; I’ve taken the further challenge to become a “teacher” of this activity.
LO2: As mentioned earlier, this is my first time teaching others in this activity. I was always the student, or the mentee, but never the mentor. This new challenge would be quite difficult for me, as even though I consider myself to be a great mathematician, being a good teacher is a tad different from being a good mathematician, and I certainly have to practise/ learn some skills to make myself a better teacher. I am planning to overcome this challenge by constantly getting feedback from the students and the supervising teacher (Ms Tippi) on what I did well and the areas I could improve on. By reflecting upon this feedback and by discussing what we could do better with my two mates, I do believe that I can easily overcome this challenge of “the first time as a teacher”.
LO5: There are two sections in this SEAMC activity: Junior and Senior. I am teaching the Junior section (grades 9 and 10 students) with two other friends. So, it requires a lot of collaboration between me and these two for us to come up with the best curriculum/ learning material as possible. We commit our Thursday lunchtime to meet and discuss the following week’s SEAMC class, and to choose what to teach in advance. I personally like collaborating with others, especially if I know them well. Since the two other people I am teaching with are quite close to me, I feel very comfortable collaborating with them and have no barrier or challenges regarding collaborating. Collaboration has helped us to come up with ideas that have helped us massively with the teaching, such as: creating a test paper together so that it is the perfect level for the students to attempt, making a PowerPoint presentation together for the following week’s class, etc. In conclusion, I strongly believe that collaborating with two of my mates in teaching the Junior students have benefitted the teaching-process massively.