EDCP 342: Instrumental vs. Relational

I have learnt math for such a long time, but I rarely thought about these two ways of teaching or learning: instrumental vs. relational.

I think many children at my time were taught relationally during their first couple of years in elementary, because for the things you learn, it was actually possible for you to understand why, (e.g. addition and multiplication).

However, as children get older, the math gets harder, usually because the math is “growing” much faster than children (I don’t think it has to, but it usually does). Therefore, more instrumental teaching and learning were applied. I remember the time when I was in my grade three math class learning something called “the scary pai”. My elementary math teacher told us that “you don’t really need to know why; the key is to know the formulas.” Very instrumental! But eventually I got it, after “plenty of exercises”.

I think Vygotsky’s social-learning theory might be of a good use here. There is the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) and for children learning something too advanced at such a young age (as many Chinese and Japanese children have experienced, even now), cognitively, they are just not ready for it. Therefore, the only way is to give them the rules and a lot of similar questions.

I have always questioned why math have to be so difficult for many children. Is it because of the children’s lack of practice or because of the teachers’ lack of efficient ways of teaching? Or both?

Thanks for reading it:)