Teacher gets kids engaged in math

DURHAM -- Math once bored Max Wolpert.

The way he saw it, formulas were learned, then memorized and used to pass tests before being pushed aside until needed again.

It wasn't until Wolpert arrived at the N.C. School of Science and Mathematics in 2008 and took Maria Hernandez's math classes that he realized how calculus could help answer real-life questions, such as figuring out how many stars are in the sky.

"With these problems, you decide what you want to focus on, there's multiple approaches," said Wolpert, 18, who graduated from NCSSM in June and will attend UNC-Chapel Hill in the fall. "And it really feels like you are powerful. You feel like you can do the math and make a [suggestion] to really have an effect on a real-world problem."

To make math engaging to students is the mission of Hernandez, 49, a math teacher at NCSSM since 1993.

Along with her daughter's crayon drawings, which plaster her office, there are two Etch A Sketches used to explain the relationship between points and parameters, wire hangers to show motion and space, and Pringles mini-containers to demonstrate the middle of a diagram resembling a horse saddle. She's even used outdoor swings to help students visualize pendulum motion from a two-dimensional view.

It is those hands-on activities, along with her willingness to share her techniques with others, that won Hernandez a Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching. Up to two teachers from each state receive the annual honor.

Each winner receives $10,000 from the National Science Foundation and a trip to Washington, D.C., for an awards ceremony, to meet with lawmakers and science leaders and to take part in educational events. It is Hernandez's first time winning the honor. She was a state finalist two years ago.

Hernandez describes her work with a flair for a subject that most would rather avoid. She's quick to demonstrate the online math course she created or show how she uses her toys and other knick knacks to teach her students.

Hernandez refers to her teaching style as 'student-centered,' where students like Wolpert run the lesson while the teacher guides them.

"It can be difficult," she said. "Part of that difficulty comes from how we were taught coming through school. Nobody showed you why math was important. So you have to be a go-getter and say, 'Let me go to one of these conferences if we have the resources.'"

A professors' child

Hernandez grew up in Wilmington after her parents immigrated to the United States from Cuba in 1961. It was easy for her to fall in love with math - her dad was a math professor, her mom a physics professor. Plus as a visual person, she enjoyed working on algebraic graphs.

"I thought of it as a puzzle," she said. "I like the symbolic part of math and recognizing patterns. That was always fun for me."

Her family was 'unusual' in two separate parts of the world. In Cuba, her mother was one of very few women with a Ph.D. in physics. When they moved to North Carolina, her mother was still the rare woman with a doctorate in science. And, they were among a tiny number of Hispanics in town.

Hernandez' upbringing made teaching a natural progression. As a freshman at UNC Wilmington, Hernandez helped teach a course to prepare UNC-W students for college-level math.

As a graduate student at N.C. State University, Hernandez caught the eye of math professor Jo-Ann Cohen, who introduced her to NCSSM.

Cohen, now N.C. State's associate dean for academic affairs in the College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, described Hernandez' teaching abilities as 'a natural gift.'

"When you watch Maria interact with students, she not only is a wonderful explainer of mathematics, she can get the student to really think about the mathematics on their own," she said. "The way one questions students and tries to help them through a problem, folks like Maria are wonderful at that. It's not the easiest thing to do, but Maria is wonderful at it."

Student-led teaching

Hernandez learned about student-led teaching while sitting in on an NCSSM geometry class. She liked how the class was about the students explaining their work in front of the class. Desks were arranged in groups so students could learn from each other.

She soon learned that the teaching method required teachers to examine themselves.

"I had that fear that I was supposed to know everything," she said. "So if I was going to use one of these problems that will take more than a day to solve, I was nervous for different reasons. I had one solution. But with the open-ended problems that lend themselves to different solution methods, if you came up with a different answer, it meant that I had to know enough mathematics to look at your solution and see if it was viable.

"Another thing was that I realized that I didn't have the answer right then, it meant that sometimes I would have to go home and study it. It does take more time and it is scarier, but it's so worth it."

Math can be cool

Hernandez says she has learned a lot from her peers, but others have also learned from her. She has kept a busy schedule: teaching math across the state through video conferencing, developing an online calculus course, tutoring eighth-grade girls in Durham and Wake through the Women in Mathematics Mentoring Program, and helping to start a NCSSM chapter of Women in Science and Engineering.

"It's important that women need to be supported because we're underrepresented in the math and science fields," she said. "I try to show girls that it's OK to be good in math and just because you're good in math doesn't mean you can't be feminine or cool with your friends."

Late last year, Donita Robinson, NCSSM's dean of mathematics, overheard one of Hernandez's lessons while working in her office and decided to watch in person.

She was impressed by the level of mathematics Hernandez' class was achieving.

"We have some pretty smart kids anyway, but unless you have a teacher that is willing to develop the kids, all they know how to do is mimic what someone else has done," Robinson said. "But she has made an effort for them to develop in that they're confident in their work and they feel like they can try out new things and that it's OK to make mistakes sometimes. And sometimes they figure out some really cool things."

For Hernandez, some of those cool things include realizing that teaching is not a forgotten profession. She doesn't know what she plans to do with her cash award, but loves to travel, so a trip to Costa Rica might be in the works.

"I think we barrel on through our daily lives and when we get something like this [award] or have the opportunity to apply, it gives you an opportunity to stop and reflect on your impact," she said. "If you talk to most teachers, they don't go into the classroom every day because of the prestige or the money.

"They do it because they love kids and they love teaching and they love their subject. To get something like this, it's exciting to be in a country that does this. This really shows that teachers may not be on the low rung of the ladder."