Math teachers can both be strict and helpful. But, there's this one teacher I recall from high school that not only she's strict, she also gives hard quizzes everyday, and she just wants us to work in groups with little help from the teacher. Is that a good form of learning experience, or is it something that you might want to avoid?

Algebra, fotoalbum y demas saberes...

The worst teacher I ever encountered was my first year high school math teacher. I was placed in an honors section in high school wherein she taught basic and intermediate algebra, but, she went through all the lessons so fast that I did not get much of what she taught. Here are some of the things she has done:

- She would give us daily, difficult math quizzes that are worth 10 points each. Incomplete answers were always marked down to zero points.

- The homework load she would give us would be 30 to 40 questions per day everyday, all to be submitted the next day.

- Her language accent did not help me at all to understand even the most basic concepts of algebraic equations and problem solving.

- She would always come in everyday as the first subject, making not only me, but also my friends, feel nervous of what quiz she'll give us.

- She would not encourage much of class participation; instead, she would just group us and answer all seat work with my group mates with little teacher's help.

- She would not allow any alternatives to her quizzes or exams; what she wrote there, she'll keep them. Worse, on the exams, sometimes, she would write questions that we have not even covered yet in class!

Fortunately now, I understand where she's coming from -- her long-time math experience has really helped a lot of students to be successful -- but, she might want to consider slowing down a little bit so that more students will understand her. She can be a smart teacher, but she's also a strict one too -- a disciplinarian of sorts.

One thing's for sure, though: she's really someone I don't want to be my teacher for a long time because of her difficulty of teaching.