Entry slip: Skemp Response - Relational Understanding and Instrumental Understanding

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Relational Understanding and Instrumental Understanding: 
Thoughts on Skemp's discussion of Relational and Instrumental mathematics


The first thought was that while I may have had a couple of teachers who taught in a relational fashion, the majority of my learning was using instrumental teaching. In fact toward the end of the article, he discusses how many teachers do use instrumental techniques because they are faster, easier with better short term ROI (return on investment). However in the long run, I have a terrible sense of direction and can only get around with use of a map. Hmmm, perhaps I missed out.


The second thought was an appreciation of how beautiful the relational method is, how much can be shared and learned and then retained. lt reminded me of child rearing. I introduced my daughter to ideas or things and explained some of the history and encouraged them to make connections between what they were seeing and my stories. The girls are growing up with so much knowledge - not just of independent things but with an understanding of the system of things.


Finally, I noticed that it is not impossible to mix the two methods and provide students with a relational understanding of the concepts while also giving them some short term satisfaction of the instrumental method. I'm curious to know if students, once knowing the short term fix, would take the time to understand the greater relational implications. Hopefully if the material is presented in a compelling way, a teacher could mix the two styles.











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