Page 15 - 영자신문최종

2020

Q. What is the hardest part and the most fruitful part about teaching?
It's hard getting ready for class and solving all the problems. When my students bring
me hard problems, I want to solve them easily, but it doesn’t always go well as I want.

The most fruitful part is seeing my student understand the way I explain things. One
day when I taught about ellipses, I really agonized over how to describe the concept.
Korean dry saunas were very popular then, and I realized that the saunas were
elliptical. An ellipse has two points called foci, and those points are “gathering” points.
When I was sitting in the corner of the sauna, I heard the voices of the people in the
other corner quite loudly. Thinking about it, both them and I were sitting on the foci.
The next day in class, I told my students that story. The students who were in that
class went into the college of education themselves and majored in mathematics.
They came back to visit and said, “You still tell students that story?” I think those kind
of experiences are the most fruitful.
Q. How did you study to be a math teacher? Do you have any special tips for
studying math?
Life doesn’t always work out according to your plan. When I was in high school,
I never thought that I would be a math teacher. My math grades were in the mid-
upper part of my grade, and I wasn’t very good at liberal arts subjects. That’s why I
mostly studied math and solved math questions at my desk. I don't have any special
tips. I will tell you about my favorite writer, Rhyu Si-min, who graduated from Seoul
National University though. If you want to go to a good college, you should be good
at math. He didn't like math though. To the question “How do you study math?” he
answered, “I read the math book ten times. I know mathematical logic because I read
that math book ten times.” If you keep repeating every logical thing in the world, you’ll
understand the logic one day, so I recommend that every student spends a good
amount of time on math.

Q. What is the important part of math class?
As students take my class will know, I usually take a lot of time explaining the
concepts. Learning a concept doesn’t come from memorizing those concepts.
Understanding a concept comes from applying the concept and solving many
questions. You can understand concepts and develop your practical abilities by solving
problems through the correct procedures, not by trying solve the problems quickly.

MYEONG-SHIN GIRLS' HIGH SCHOOL + 15