Five principles of extraordinary math teaching | Dan Finkel | TEDxRainier

In this perspective-expanding and enjoyable talk, Dan Finkel invites us to approach learning and teaching math with courage, curiosity, and a sense of play.

Dan Finkel wants everyone to have fun with math. After completing his Ph.D. in algebraic geometry at the University of Washington, he decided that teaching math was the most important contribution he could make to the world. He has devoted much of his life to understanding and teaching the motivation, history, aesthetics, and deep structure of mathematics.

Dan is the founder and director of Operations of Math for Love, a Seattle-based organization devoted to transforming how math is taught and learned. A teacher of teachers and students, Dan works with schools, develops curriculum, leads teacher workshops, and gives talks on mathematics and education throughout the Pacific Northwest and beyond.

Dan is one of the creators of Prime Climb, the beautiful, colorful, mathematical board game. He contributes regularly to the New York Times Numberplay blog and hosts Seattle’s Julia Robinson Math Festival annually. In his spare time he performs improv comedy in Seattle.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at http://ted.com/tedx

A friend of mine told me recently
that her six-year-old son

had come from school
and said he hated math.

And this is hard for me to hear
because I actually love math.

The beauty and power of mathematical
thinking have changed my life.

But I know that many people
lived a very different story.

Math can be the best of times
or the worst of times,

an exhilarating journey of discovery

or descent into tedium,
frustration, and despair.

Mathematical miseducation
is so common we can hardly see it.

We practically expect math class

to be repetition and memorization
of disjointed technical facts.

And we're not surprised
when students aren't motivated,

when they leave school disliking math,

even committed to avoiding it
for the rest of their lives.

Without mathematical literacy,
their career opportunities shrink.

And they become easy prey
for credit card companies,

payday lenders, the lottery,

(Laughter)

and anyone, really, who wants
to dazzle them with a statistic.

Did you know that if you insert
a single statistic into an assertion,

people are 92 percent more likely
to accept it without question?

(Laughter)

Yeah, I totally made that up.

(Laughter)

And 92 percent is - it has weight
even though it's completely fabricated.

And that's how it works.

When we're not comfortable with math,

we don't question
the authority of numbers.

But what's happening
with mathematical alienation

is only half the story.

Right now, we're squandering
our chance to touch life after life

with the beauty and power
of mathematical thinking.

I led a workshop on this topic recently,
and at the end, a woman raised her hand

and said that the experience
made her feel - and this is a quote -

"like a God."

(Laughter)

That's maybe the best
description I've ever heard

for what mathematical
thinking can feel like,

so we should examine what it looks like.

A good place to start

is with the words of the philosopher
and mathematician René Descartes,

who famously proclaimed,
"I think, therefore I am."

But Descartes looked deeper
into the nature of thinking.

Once he established himself
as a thing that thinks,

he continued, "What is a thinking thing?"

It is the thing that doubts,
understands, conceives,

that affirms and denies,
wills and refuses,

that imagines also,

and perceives.

This is the kind of thinking we need
in every math class every day.

So, if you are a teacher or a parent
or anyone with a stake in education,

I offer these five principles

to invite thinking into the math
we do at home and at school.

Principle one: start with a question.

The ordinary math class
begins with answers

and never arrives at a real question.

"Here are the steps
to multiply. You repeat.

Here are the steps to divide. You repeat.

We've covered the material.
We're moving on."

What matters in the model
is memorizing the steps.

There's no room to doubt
or imagine or refuse,

so there's no real thinking here.

What would it look like
if we started with a question?

For example, here
are the numbers from 1 to 20.

Now, there's a question
lurking in this picture,

hiding in plain sight.

What's going on with the colors?

Now, intuitively it feels like
there's some connection

between the numbers and the colors.

I mean, maybe it's even possible to extend
the coloring to more numbers.

At the same time, the meaning
of the colors is not clear.

It's a real mystery.

And so, the question
feels authentic and compelling.

And like so many authentic
mathematical questions,

this one has an answer that is
both beautiful and profoundly satisfying.

And of course, I'm not going
to tell you what it is.

(Laughter)

I don't think of myself as a mean person,

but I am willing to deny you
what you want.

(Laughter)

Because I know if I rush to an answer,

I would've robbed you
of the opportunity to learn.

Thinking happens only
when we have time to struggle.

And that is principle two.

It's not uncommon for students
to graduate from high school

believing that every math problem
can be solved in 30 seconds or less,

and if they don't know the answer,
they're just not a math person.

This is a failure of education.

We need to teach kids
to be tenacious and courageous,

to persevere in the face of difficulty.

The only way to teach perseverance

is to give students time
to think and grapple with real problems.

I brought this image
into a classroom recently,

and we took the time to struggle.

And the longer we spent, the more
the class came alive with thinking.

The students made observations.

They had questions.

Like,

"Why do the numbers in that last column
always have orange and blue in them?"

and "Does it mean anything that the green
spots are always going diagonally?"

and "What's going on
with those little white numbers

in the red segments?

Is it important that those
are always odd numbers?"

Struggling with a genuine question,

students deepen their curiosity
and their powers of observation.

They also develop
the ability to take a risk.

Some students noticed
that every even number has orange in it,

and they were willing to stake a claim.

"Orange must mean even."

And then they asked, "Is that right?"

(Laughter)

This can be a scary place as a teacher.

A student comes to you
with an original thought.

What if you don't know the answer?

Well, that is principle three:
you are not the answer key.

Teachers, students may ask you questions
you don't know how to answer.

And this can feel like a threat.

But you are not the answer key.

Students who are inquisitive

is a wonderful thing
to have in your classroom.

And if you can respond by saying,

"I don't know. Let's find out,"

math becomes an adventure.

And parents, this goes for you too.

When you sit down to do math
with your children,

you don't have to know all the answers.

You can ask your child
to explain the math to you

or try to figure it out together.

Teach them that not knowing
is not failure.

It's the first step to understanding.

So, when this group of students
asked me if orange means even,

I don't have to tell them the answer.

I don't even need to know the answer.

I can ask one of them to explain to me
why she thinks it's true.

Or we can throw the idea out to the class.

Because they know the answers
won't come from me,

they need to convince themselves
and argue with each other

to determine what's true.

And so, one student says,
"Look, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12.

I checked all of the even numbers.

They all have orange in them.

What more do you want?"

And another student says,
"Well, wait a minute,

I see what you're saying,

but some of those numbers
have one orange piece,

some have two or three.

Like, look at 48.

It's got four orange pieces.

Are you telling me that 48
is four times as even as 46?

There must be more to the story."

By refusing to be the answer key,

you create space for this kind
of mathematical conversation and debate.

And this draws everyone in
because we love to see people disagree.

After all, where else can you see
real thinking out loud?

Students doubt, affirm, deny, understand.

And all you have to do as the teacher
is not be the answer key

and say "yes" to their ideas.

And that is principle four.

Now, this one is difficult.

What if a student comes to you
and says 2 plus 2 equals 12?

You've got to correct them, right?

And it's true, we want students
to understand certain basic facts

and how to use them.

But saying "yes" is not the same thing
as saying "You're right."

You can accept ideas,
even wrong ideas, into the debate

and say "yes" to your students' right

to participate in the act
of thinking mathematically.

To have your idea dismissed
out of hand is disempowering.

To have it accepted, studied,
and disproven is a mark of respect.

It's also far more convincing to be shown
you're wrong by your peers

than told you're wrong by the teacher.

But allow me to take this a step further.

How do you actually know
that 2 plus 2 doesn't equal 12?

What would happen
if we said "yes" to that idea?

I don't know.

Let's find out.

So, if 2 plus 2 equaled 12,

then 2 plus 1 would be one less,
so that would be 11.

And that would mean that 2 plus 0,
which is just 2, would be 10.

But if 2 is 10, then 1 would be 9,

and 0 would be 8.

And I have to admit this looks bad.

It looks like we broke mathematics.

But I actually understand
why this can't be true now.

Just from thinking about it,

if we were on a number line,

and if I'm at 0,
8 is eight steps that way,

and there's no way
I could take eight steps

and wind up back where I started.

Unless ...

(Laughter)

well, what if it wasn't a number line?

What if it was a number circle?

Then I could take eight steps
and wind back where I started.

8 would be 0.

In fact, all of the infinite numbers
on the real line would be stacked up

in those eight spots.

And we're in a new world.

And we're just playing here, right?

But this is how new math gets invented.

Mathematicians have actually been studying
number circles for a long time.

They've got a fancy name and everything:

modular arithmetic.

And not only does the math work out,

it turns out to be ridiculously useful

in fields like cryptography
and computer science.

It's actually no exaggeration to say

that your credit card number
is safe online

because someone was willing to ask,

"What if it was a number circle
instead of a number line?"

So, yes, we need to teach students
that 2 plus 2 equals 4.

But also we need to say "yes"
to their ideas and their questions

and model the courage
we want them to have.

It takes courage to say,
"What if 2 plus 2 equals 12?"

and actually explore the consequences.

It takes courage to say,

"What if the angles in a triangle
didn't add up to 180 degrees?"

or "What if there were
a square root of negative 1?"

or "What if there were
different sizes of infinity?"

But that courage and those questions

led to some of the greatest
breakthroughs in history.

All it takes is willingness to play.

And that is principle five.

Mathematics is not about following rules.

It's about playing

and exploring and fighting
and looking for clues

and sometimes breaking things.

Einstein called play
the highest form of research.

And a math teacher who lets
their students play with math

gives them the gift of ownership.

Playing with math can feel

like running through the woods
when you were a kid.

And even if you were on a path,
it felt like it all belonged to you.

Parents, if you want to know

how to nurture the mathematical
instincts of your children,

play is the answer.

What books are to reading,
play is to mathematics.

And a home filled with blocks
and puzzles and games and play

is a home where mathematical
thinking can flourish.

I believe we have the power to help
mathematical thinking flourish everywhere.

We can't afford to misuse math
to create passive rule-followers.

Math has the potential
to be our greatest asset

in teaching the next generation
to meet the future

with courage, curiosity, and creativity.

And if all students get a chance

to experience the beauty and power
of authentic mathematical thinking,

maybe it won't sound
so strange when they say,

"Math?

I actually love math."

Thank you.

(Applause)