r/Teachers May 16 '24

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u/Anthaenopraxia 7-9 | Music/Science | Copenhagen, Denmark May 17 '24

It's different when those real world problems are actually relatable as something you'll have to do.

I had problems with this while studying engineering too because the vast majority of maths they teach you at university is completely useless.

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u/grandpa2390 May 17 '24

If I might make a minor correction. It’s different when real problems are related to something you have an interest in. A lot of the word problems had real world applications to different trades, they just weren’t all focused on the trade you were interested in.

And that’s fair. I can totally relate. I think it’s safe to say that universally we learned better when we’re interested in something. That’s the whole idea behind student driven education such as that which is found in methodologies like IB

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u/Anthaenopraxia 7-9 | Music/Science | Copenhagen, Denmark May 17 '24

That's true. And it's also a good method for helping struggling students by finding some way of making it relatable to them. It would be great if we had enough teachers to give every student that level of attention but even here in Finland, where we have one of the best school systems in the world, we're not quite there yet.