We all stayed late at school tonight for Parent’s Night.

I met about 8 or 9 parents tonight. Many of them couldn’t speak English and relied on their children to translate for them, but I felt that I got to form an important connection with each of them. I told parents about our classroom rules, how they could get in touch with me, and most importantly, how to help their children in mathematics (ask children to explain their work to parents, reinforce positive attitudes towards mathematics by combating the “I’m just not good at math” myth). I also warned parents of Algebra 1 students that the CPM book looks very different from a traditional math text book and assured them that students will learn a lot from this approach. I didn’t tell parents anything about my background or reasons for teaching math; just felt like that wasn’t really important.

I’m also off to a workshop so won’t be updating this blog for a few days. I’m hope my sub has a pleasant, stress-free experience.