Michael Benson

I have taught math for six years in the public school system and each class has been built around discussion based concepts. This has worked for all levels; homeschoolers, special education, regular ed, honors/advanced, including gifted and talented. I like to tie the lesson into how it applies to every day life or interesting activities in order to help the student learn the mathematical patterns through basic knowledge. Math is built on patterns and processes, once a learner understands that and can figure out how to apply the patterns and concepts, mathematics is much less stressful and complex. Understanding the basics opens the door for applications to become more successful and sophisticated. Lesson should be held as conversational discussions with different applications to make connections as hands-on as possible. This allows the most struggling of learners build a connection to the material or lesson that is being discussed. That discussion is then tailored to numbers that help make the concept more concrete and hands-on.