My Journey of Lifelong Learning

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

Assignment 1; Educ 430
Claire McCann
10052157
Thursday, October 9, 2014

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

I am an only child of two Northern Irish immigrant parents who

came to Canada during the height of the troubles amongst Catholics
and Protestants in the nineteen eighties. For twenty-four years, the
entirety of my life, I have known how lucky I am to have been given the
chance to grow up in one of the most prosperous and opportunity filled
countries in the world. The understanding of where I could have grown
up if my parents had not made the difficult decision to emigrate, has
only ever fueled my desire to become as successful and accomplished
as I possibly can be. Ever since I can remember, my parents explained
to me that education was the key that opens every door. I in turn
immersed myself in school and found a passion for learning that has
recently developed into a passion for teaching. In the following few
paragraphs, I will explain how my early influences, passions and
talents have affected who I am as a learner, and how they will mold the
educator I am becoming.
My dads love for learning was one of the greatest influences I
had growing up. He has four university degrees from all over the world
and has worked as a psychology professor as well as a family lawyer.
His unending desire to acquire new knowledge has most definitely
rubbed off on me. From the time I could read and write, my dad made
sure to talk to me about the importance of books, numbers, and
language. At three years old, I started attending the Calgary French
School, a private French immersion elementary school. It was there

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

that I learned to speak fluent French and where I initially found my

passion and talent for mathematics. As my grade three teacher drilled
the class with multiplication flashcards, I remember thinking I had
found something that I was really good at.
In junior high, my parents enrolled me in a math enrichment
course taught by Aaron Renert, who is now the founder and owner of
the Renert tutoring centres as well as the Renert School. They believed
that I was not being challenged enough at my Catholic junior high
school, Madeleine dHouet, so they sought the help of Aaron. So many
students seem to lose interest in math at the junior high level because
it gets too hard or its too boring. I kept an interesting editorial I
found in the Globe and Mail (2014) earlier this year, it wrote As it turns
out, for kids learning math, theres something even more off putting
than boredom: a lack of knowledge, and struggling to solve real-world
problems because they lack a strong grounding in math
fundamentals. (p. F9). Being in Aaron Renerts math class was the first
time I was being taught by a true mathematician. He told myself and
my three fellow classmates, that the only rule for the hour long class
was to not pick up a pencil. Everything we were going to solve was
going to be computed in our heads. I remember this experience with
such clarity, because it reignited my interest in math and was the first
time an educator had authentically inspired me.

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

I continued to pursue my interest in math at Western Canada

High School in the full French IB program. However, I came to realize
that in the IB program, I was not going to be able to pursue my other
non-academic interests because the workload was simply too much.
Ive always been involved in sports, dance, and music, and my parents
always made sure those activities were just as important as schooling.
So in my grade eleven year, I made the decision to drop the IB
program, making time to discover my propensity for rugby. Winning the
Division One city championship in my grade twelve year was
confirmation that I had made the right decision. I continue to always
try and remember that balance is key and you can be successful at
things without allowing them to be all consuming.
I went to Queens University in the fall of 2008, hoping to pursue
my science degree in psychology. I took two math classes in my first
semester; calculus and linear algebra. I ended up doing so well in
those two classes that I could once again not ignore my affinity for
mathematics. I changed my major in my second year, and embarked
on what would be the hardest challenge of my life thus far; acquiring
my degree in math. The Queens math department was largely
unfunded and in my second year my professors were masters
students. I made the decision to transfer home and attend the
University of Calgary for the last three years of my degree. Many of the
professors throughout the course of my degree, fulfilled every

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

stereotype that math geeks so often embody. But those who were
the exception, were the ones who left a lasting mark on me as a
learner. Viena Stastna, an associate professor in the math department,
influenced me greatly because she is an informed, successful and
intellectual woman in a male dominated faculty. She is funny, witty and
in charge. I relished the moments in her class as I knew it was a rare
commodity to find a university math professor who had both the
knowledge and the personality to make fourth year calculus sound
exciting.
It was in December 2013 that I wrote the final math exam of my
degree. I celebrated by doing something crazy; I left on January 5th,
2014, for a month long volunteer teaching project in Morocco. Up until
this point, my teaching experience involved the odd math tutoring job
here and there. This trip opened my eyes to the globalization of
learning and teaching. As the students trickled into the after-school
program, I noticed that the posters on the walls and the configuration
of the desks werent much different than you would find in a Canadian
classroom. It was when I started to teach them English that I realized
the gaps of knowledge that existed all around me. Some of the
students were proficient in English when others could not even say
hello. So I did what I know best, I resorted back to math. Another
thing Ive always found so intriguing about mathematics is that it is
truly a universal language. The moment I scribbled 4 X 2 on the old

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

chalkboard of that Moroccan classroom, they all shouted out the

answers. This became my bond with the kids for the next few weeks. I
brought a pair of blow up dice I had packed in the very bottom of my
backpack and as the classes wore on, we would play games with
numbers as they learned how to utter the answers in English.
When I returned home from Africa, I started working for a
tutoring company called Club Z In Home Tutoring. It seems obvious
now, but it opened my eyes to the fact that you dont always have to
travel half way around the world to find children who are in need of
your help. You can sometimes drive five minutes down the road and
find a student who is just as worthy and just as in need. It was during
my work with Club Z that I received my acceptance letter from the
Werklund School of Education. I decided that now would be the
appropriate time to give Aaron Renert a call and let him know all that I
had accomplished in the last five years. Upon meeting him in the lobby
of the Renert School, sat next to a life-sized chess set, I told him I had
graduated with my degree in math and was about to pursue my degree
in education. He wasnt entirely surprised; Aaron always seemed to be
aware of my potential. He asked me how soon I could start working as
a teacher for his new program called Bright Minds. This is a math
enrichment program he has established geared towards young children
who show accelerated math ability. The program bases its curriculum
off of the Singapore math textbooks and relies heavily on direct

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

instruction and drills. Nielsen (2014) describes drills and practice in

her text as being the emphasis {is} on repetition to hone the skill or
provide a strong link to the information to improve remembering it.
(p.184). This is exactly how we teach the children in Bright Minds, as
the belief is that with repetition they will master the early
fundamentals of math. I now find myself in the very same classrooms I
spent my high school years, teaching 5 and 6 year olds how to multiply
three digit numbers with three digit numbers.
Throughout my twenties, I have always stayed aware of the
changes the math curriculum has undergone in schools. I have cut out
newspaper articles that explain and critique this new concept of
discovery learning. The fundamentals of math are just that, and
students are not going to be able to excel before they master these
basic concepts. I know my first month here at the Werklund school has
put great emphasis on the notion of inquiry learning and although I
am interested in getting to know more, I fully understand that
traditional math teaching does not involve relying on the students to
come up with Pythagoras theorem on their own. When I sit down to
tutor a student in grade eight who still doesnt know their
multiplication table, I provide them with one. As an educator in the
very beginning of my career, I have already been made aware of the
challenges that I may face with the controversies surrounding math
and how it should be taught.

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

My own experiences in the world of math will greatly affect who I

become as an educator. My beliefs on how math is most affectively
communicated will be shared amongst my colleagues and students as
often as I am afforded the opportunity. Honey (2014), the author of the
textbook in my STEM class, explains how important it is to make the
linkages between math and other subject areas and that is something I
will strive to do as an educator. Create ways in which all of the strands
are inextricably intertwined. (p.19). I am becoming more and more
aware of how my early influences both in school and out, have molded
my interests and my talents. The only thing I am certain of is that in
order for me to become the best educator I can be, I must relish the
fact that I will in turn be a lifelong learner.

My Journey of Lifelong Learning

References
Kristen Nielsen (Ed.) (2014), An Introduction to teaching, learning, and
school culture: A

reader for beginning teachers (p. 184). Dubuque,

IA: Kendall Hunt.

Globe and Mail (March 2014), Mom, whats a times table?, Editorial

Honey, M., Pearson, G., & Schweingruber, H. (Eds.). (2014). STEM Integration in K-12
Education. Washington, DC, United States: The National Academies Press.