My educational beliefs:

  • I believe that knowledge is not separate from but rather embedded within experiences and interpreted by the learner. Knowledge then is about interpretation, and making meaning of the environment. In other words, though all students may more or less share one information, each student conceives of it in different ways based on his/her prior experiences and basic math skills.


  • I believe that learning is not about producing specific outcomes, but the process by which those outcomes are produced. Products need to be evaluated within the contexts they were produced. Product assessment should also be rich and multimodal to include as many different ways of expressing meaning as possible, such as, portfolios.


  • I also believe that learning is not about reproducing what the teacher is doing but rather creating something original from what has been learned.


  • I strongly believe in collaboration. In addition to all benefits of group work, I think that it promotes indirect learning experiences gained through all kinds of feedback.



    • My goals for math classes:

    Instead of focusing on training individuals for tests, my goal for the course is to educate students and help them learn better. It means to engage students in becoming an active part of a classroom and an online learning environment, where students are encouraged to take a risk without any fear to drop their grades. In such environment good grades come naturally from active students participation and their hard work.

    I try to teach not only technology skills, but also focuses on learning how to learn (setting expectations, using a reflective learning process, communicating in electronic environments, building learning communities, capitalizing on learning styles, and doing research).


    My regular classroom and the Internet

    My main goal for the classes is to create a learning community (live and cyber)that allows each student to share information, experiences, discoveries, and emotions in an ongoing exchange. This required a high level of interaction; and that interaction on my best knowledge could be accomplished only through a combination of curriculum and Web page design, with a teacher acting as a learning facilitator.

    Educational Technology

    In spite of my recent reservations about the using any technology in the math classroom, I have to admit that the educational technology gives teachers very powerful interactive tools that guide learners to the creation of personal knowledge. Even though it is not easy to admit and change a teaching style for an experienced teacher, I believe that I have to modify my traditional teaching structure, where a controlled system of delivering knowledge from a teacher to students is a core for students education, to a new, more progressive and technology-based style of a course delivery.

    Ocasionally, I don't have sufficient technology skills in order to present my course in the best possible way as I see it could be delievered. In such cases I don't hesistate asking my students, who are often ahead of me in their knowledge of computers, for help. We work together in a very positive environment on how to improve our math class, and how to enhance it with the helpful technology. I usually show students how much I value their input into the course, and they really appreciate my trust and recognition of their work. In addition to benefits of any group work, I think that it promotes indirect learning experiences for students gained through our unformal, out of a regular classroom communication.
    So far it has been the best team-work experience I have ever had in my teaching practice.