Teacher explains award-winning method

In spring 2008, Debbie Reynolds had worked hard in pursuit of National Board certification when her principal urged her to seek yet another honor.

So Reynolds went back into her fourth-grade classroom at Westdale Heights Academic Magnet elementary school and persuaded a student teacher to videotape a lesson — three times as long as the lesson Reynolds had done for the National Board. She also answered a lot of questions and sent off the packet.

More than a year later, Reynolds is one of 87 teachers from around the country to win the Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching, and the only one in Louisiana.

It’s the highest national honor for science and math teachers, and it comes with a free trip to Washington, D.C., and $10,000.

In April, Reynolds was named teacher of the year for elementary schools in East Baton Rouge Parish.

For Reynolds, the recognition is lagniappe.

“I love to come to work,” said Reynolds, who is starting her 27th year as a teacher. “Every day is different when it comes to children. They challenge me.”

Reynolds learned of her good fortune on July 7. The official announcement was made later that week.

Reynolds, however, is not taking the summer off.

Earlier this month she attended a conference in Las Vegas where she learned how they teach math in Singapore, a country long at or near the top of international math competitions.

“They teach fewer things for higher mastery,” Reynolds said.

She is trying out some of this Singapore math in a small summer remedial class at her school to help prepare third-graders struggling in math for fourth grade.

On Thursday, she tried out a Singapore-style regrouping method used to simplify how students subtract large numbers.

At first, she had students try to solve problems on their own and some struggled.

“This one is wrong, this one is wrong, this one is wrong,” she said gently, but firmly to one child. “Now, go back and fix them.”

But as she walked the students through the regrouping method, they answered more and more problems correctly.

Growing up, Reynolds loved math, but it was a boy’s field, and girls were expected to do other things.

In her classroom she tries to demystify math and make it concrete — on one problem Thursday, she had a child count the minute marks on a classroom clock to get the right answer.

“I try to relate it to real life,” Reynolds said. “I try to get my children to be problem solvers.”

Still, generational patterns of innumeracy are not easy to break.

“A lot of parents have a block against math that they pass on to their children,” she said.

Math stigma is dissipating. Now, Reynolds has more female students who excel at math and more mothers employed in math-intensive fields.

Reynolds is not rigid in her approach. She said children reach answers in a variety of ways and all she asks is that they justify how they arrived at the right answer.

“I teach 70 different children every day,” Reynolds said. “It keeps you on your toes and keeps things interesting and exciting.”