改進中学代数教学方法的幾点尝試——学习毛主席著作,改革教学的初步体会

HOW WE TAUGHT ALGEBRA IN MIDDLE SCHOOLS: TEACHING REFORM AS THE FRUIT OF OUR STUDY OF CHAIRMAN MAO'S WORKS

在中学数学教学中如何学习运用毛主席的教育思想,废止注入式、采用启发式、反对繁瑣主义、貫彻少而精的原則,使学生生动活泼主动地学习,这是中学数学教学改革的一个重要問題。这个問題已引起广大数学教育工作者的热烈探討。本文試图結合我們的教学,談談改进中学代数教学方法的几点尝試。

We have been teaching algebra in middle schools for some time. We teach the essentials and see that our students learn them well, and by means of suggestive hints and illuminating comments we induce our students to think out the subject-matter themselves. From our study of Chairman Mac's works and from practical experience in the middle schools we gain an insight into teaching, and we become quite clear about the following:—— 1. Ideological work on the students Ideological work should be done on the students so that they know what aim they should have in their study; only then will their initiative be brought into play. Here is an illustrative example. Before we began the chapter on Fractions, it occurred to us that, as this part of book-work involes a lot of calculations with figures, the students might consider it too elementary to merit serious attention and might shirk it as tedious drudgery; and we did ideological work accordingly. Mobilization and discussion meetings were held, and the students got over the wrong ideas and were in the right frame of mind for study. They became more active and more conscious. The time it took us to finish this chapter was only one half of that which it had taken the teachers in the previous years. 2. The principle of 'Practice——Knowledge——Practice' This prin ciple should be followed in teaching. Take the teaching of the chapter on Linear Functions as an example. Students have a hazy notion of linear functions if they learn through listening to class-room lectures only. Our students learnt in a different way. Under our guidance they performed experi ments in physics and obtained mathematical data; they plotted graphs according to these data and derived a law of physics which is reducible to a athematical statement involving linear functions. Thus through their own practice our students acquired a clear grasp of linear functions. 3. The principal contradiction in the subject-matter This principal contradiction should be made much of. For instance, when we taught the chapter on Quadratic Equations with two variables, we made much of the principal contradiction, namely, the linearizing of a function; we furnished three worked examples and in the light of them discussed the linearization succinctly, and our students grasped the main points of quadratic equations with two variables. The time it took us to finish this chapter was only one third of that which it had taken the teachers in the previous years.