A Year in the Life: Ambient Math Wins the Race to the Top!
Day 230
For one year, 365 days, this blog will address the Common Core Standards from the perspective of creating an alternate, ambient learning environment for math. Ambient is defined as “existing or present on all sides, an all-encompassing atmosphere.”
And ambient music is defined as: “Quiet and relaxing with melodies that repeat many times. Why ambient? A math teaching style that’s whole and all encompassing, with themes that repeat many times through the years, is most likely to be effective and successful.
Today was a busy day, Math By Hand intensive! We were filling up the bins and shelves with kits and packages and binders, like the shoemakers who were lucky enough to have the help of skillful elves in the night. Only I’m afraid our workshop will look exactly the same in the morning. Oh well, it is a labor of love and that makes it all worthwhile, elves or no elves.
So, a lighter post today. But a very informative one, from the Philadelphia Waldorf school’s blog, Loving Learning. Click here to access the blog, where you will find an extensive comparison of Waldorf with mainstream education, along with many reference links. Waldorf’s qualities and advantages can be elusive since it lives in a more artful zone than educational systems that are more straightforward and practical.
Here’s a chalkboard drawing of a geometric circle, also from the Philadelphia Waldorf School. Sixth grade students take on geometric drawing with instruments after five years of freehand form drawing geometry in the lower grades. Knowledge ensues in an environment dedicated to imaginative, creative knowing, where student and teacher alike surrender to the ensuing of knowledge as a worthy goal. Tune in tomorrow as we continue to explore ambient counterparts to the CCSS language arts standards.
