Letter to David Mitchell Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Letter to David Mitchell - Assignment Example I believe that boring teachers should reconsider their approaches of teaching. While teaching the same curriculum becomes boring, year in and year out, making the subject interesting is the challenge for the teacher. It becomes easier for the teacher to teach the same subject after each year passes by; and most teachers take the easy option. While it does become easier, it becomes more challenging in the way the teacher should approach the topic. Christine Gilbert by making the proposal of sacking boring teachers is jolting them awake and pushing the envelope further for these boring teachers. She is shocking them into action and I believe that it is high time someone did that. Did you know that high school dropout is increasing at an alarming pace and more than 50 percent of the students cite boring teachers and lack of interest in the subject taught at school as the primary reason for leaving school? In one sentence you suggest that that, "one of the reasons for this may be that th ey are bored themselves†. I agree that the teachers may become bored but this is no excuse against teaching boring lessons. The teacher can stimulate interest by involving students in the lesson. However, as I say all this I realize that teachers cannot do this all the time. They are pressed for resources and time. They have to teach so much in so little time with the principal hounding them to maintain discipline in class. Schools are becoming boring, it is not the teachers but the school that is becoming boring by being too rule oriented. Teachers, however, can change this by asking the school authorities to be more accommodating. Did you not have any teacher whose lessons you looked forward to? I know I have had such teachers. I also have had my share of boring and interesting teachers. Some teachers are boring because they have no interest in teaching. They take their job as just a job. They take a responsibility of teaching students and they just do that. However, there a re teachers who understand the essence of being a teacher. They engage us. I think boring teachers are only churning out students who are ill equipped to handle higher education such as colleges and universities. Even though I understand that teachers are not very highly paid, I do not think that I would want such teachers to be paid to teach me. I want teachers who are passionate about their jobs and are ready to accept the challenge of fighting the boredom of the same subject.. For me, the best teacher should have the following qualities: She should be passionate about her job; She should be able to communicate with the students on their level; and She should come up with lessons that activate the minds of the students. You state that Christine Gilbert's ideas ‘ignores the fact that some of the things children really ought to learn are boring...Are we going to phase out math in favour of more media studies and dance?’ Here again I disagree, Math is not boring. When yo u say that ‘quadratic equations are boring the first time’, it makes me wonder what boring teachers you have had. Some subjects are dry but they can be made more interesting in the way they are caught. Even media studies and dance can be made boring if the teacher focuses on too much technicality and theory. I understand that theory is boring and needs to be taught. But when a teacher focuses too much on theory and less of practical knowledge, students lose interest. You state that students

Pythagorean Theorem Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Pythagorean Theorem - Essay Example â€Å"The area of the square built upon the hypotenuse of a right triangle is equal to the sum of the areas of the squares upon the remaining sides† (Audy & Morosini, 2007). Hence, the Pythagorean Theorem can be used to find out the length of the side of a right angled triangle when the lengths of the two other sides are known. The theorem has a range of real life applications. For instance, it can be used to measure the distance between two cities in a map, height of an object from the length of its shadow, the length of the diagonal of a rectangle and for many other purposes. The longest side of a triangle is called hypotenuse, while the remaining two sides are called the legs of the triangle. The algebraic expression of the Pythagorean Theorem can be written as follows: As Sonnenberg, Wittenberg, Ferrucci, Mueller and Simeone (1981) point out, the Pythagorean Theorem is helpful to calculate the unknown length of a side of a right angled triangle, if the lengths of the other two sides are known. Similarly, in a right angled triangle, the length of the hypotenuse is greater than other two sides, but less than the sum of their lengths. The above figure contains four copies of a right angled triangle having sides a, b, and c; which are arranged in a square having side c. Hence, each triangle has an area of  ½ab whereas the small square has a side b-a and an area (b – a) 2. Hence, the area of the large square becomes, It has been proved that the converse of this theorem is also true. Hence, for any triangle with sides a, b, and c; and a2 + b2 = c2, the angle between the legs a and b will be a right angle (90o) (cited in Serra, 1994). In total, Pythagorean Theorem is one of the fundamental theorems of mathematics. The theorem has a range of proofs and its converse is also true. Above all, it has a wide range of applications in the real life. Sonnenberg, E. V., Wittenberg, J., Ferrucci, J. T., Mueller, P. R. & Simeone, J. F. (1981).