Welcome fellow Recovering Traditionalists to Episode 28.  Today we are looking at Teaching Mathematics through Problem Solving.

Unfortunately, what we think of about Problem Solving has greatly been influenced by textbooks (just another reason why I’m not a fan of them).  If you open up almost any elementary math textbook you will find lessons on Problem Solving. These lessons are well-meaning but they try to teach students steps to follow when solving problems.  This has always bugged me and I wasn’t quite sure how to express why until I read it in the book Teaching Mathematics through Problem Solving which is a publication of NCTM and was edited by Frank K. Lester Jr. Get all the info here: buildmathminds.com/28