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Honestly, none.Some movie teachers are really a joke, such as the party animal Phil in “The Hangover” or Cameron Diaz in “Bad Teacher”. That's okay, because we know they are in the clown category.The HangoverOthers are larger than life and determined to change students' life for the better. The latter one shouldn't be a problem of course, but onscreen teachers overdo it. Such examples are Morgan Freeman's character in “Lean on Me" (he plays a principal), or Michelle Pfeiffer’s character in “Dangerous Minds".Lean on MeThey want to change students' parents or whole communities, they help their students financially without the school principal's or the parents' consent, stick their noses in the students' private lives, or influence the choice of their future careers at all cost. Also, they often play the roles of social workers, public motivators or psychiatrists.Dangerous MindsTeachers should inspire, but they should also know their boundaries. Instead of going on one-man secret life-saving missions, they should cooperate both with their school administration and parents, and stick to protocols, no matter what the problem might be. People outside schools forget that each school has its own policy, and every single decision has to be discussed, evaluated and confirmed before being put into written form. There is no much room for heroism or improvisation.But, there is one British TV series that was quite realistic, up to a certain point - Waterloo Road.Students and teachers seemed natural because acting was really good. The situations, the amount of stress and anxiety some teachers and students faced, and the buzzy and loud school atmosphere were lifelike. Unfortunaly, like most TV shows, this one also suffered from exaggerating. After the first promising episodes, eventually we faced way too many students drinking, fighting, doing drugs, and too many student-teacher relationships, which becomes more evident as the show progresses. As if average students didn't even exist.Waterloo RoadSo, back to the question. Teaching is not portayed realistically.It's too boring for the big screen.

I don’t know why math teachers don’t do it, but I sure as hell hope they keep not doing it!There are many reasons why they shouldn’t, but the most important one, the fundamental reason, is that this frames math as a boring tool that is useful for achieving exciting goals. This is obviously completely backwards. If you take your own subject matter seriously, you can’t sell it with “well I admit it’s boring as hell, but look at all the cool stuff you can do with it!”. No!Math is a creative discipline, and should be compared to the arts. We don’t do art because it allows us to achieve external goals. We do art because it is a form of human expression, which allows us to make sense of the world around us and gain new perspectives. That is why we do mathematics.I am very much in favour of trying to convey a mathematical perspective, but that’s different. For example, I like the puzzle where you’re on the beach, and someone is a little further along, out in the ocean, drowning, and you need to save them. Given your positions and your top speed on the beach and in the water, work out what is the best place to enter the ocean such that you’ll reach the drowning person as fast as possible.This is not a “real world use”: I’m pretty sure I’m never going to be in that position, and if it does happen, I’m sure I’m not going to do the required calculations. Rather, it demonstrates a particular way of looking at the world. If you have a practical problem like that, you can try to abstract it, remove all the unnecessary details, and see what the fundamental structure of the question is. There is an inherent joy associated with that, especially when you start recognising things (hey! The best way for this robot arm to move is exactly like that one puzzle where you had to rescue someone from the sea!) and a real sense of accomplishment if you work out how to do this on your own (rather than just applying the method you’ve just been taught, which is what maths education is unfortunately usually like).A second reason is that it is not the teacher’s responsibility to drag a bunch of unwilling students along. That’s like trying to have sex with a woman who just lies there. Learning is a cooperative effort between teacher and student. The student has to be motivated and interested in learning a new subject. The teacher’s responsibility is to facilitate that learning, and to provide the right stimulation and challenges. Students who clamour for “real world uses” are often really saying, “We are passive consumers of your classes; we do not necessarily trust this course will be of interest for us. Teacher, it is your responsibility to motivate us. If you do a good job of entertaining us, we’ll fill out high marks on your evaluation form later. Also we expect a complete breakdown of what we do and don’t have to know for the exam.” A teacher should never accept that responsibility. When I teach at uni I do try to be engaging, and to show my own enthusiasm for my subject. I feel responsible for telling a good story. But I’m not responsible for making my students get off their asses.Of course many people don’t care about mathematics. That’s fine. It’s crazy we’re forcing so many of them to take it anyway, which results in a mediocre experience for everyone.

In Ontario, we D2L (Desire 2 Learn) which is the same platform that Colleges and Universities use in my province. I like D2L and have used it since 2011 when I started using blended learning. In addition, I also use a Google site for each of my classes. This is especially useful when I teach Cooperative Education as parents and employers can access class information in addition to Accident Forms, Student Evaluation Forms and Calendar. With other subjects, I put assignments on the class site and this is especially useful if/when the HUB (what my Board calls the digital platform) goes down.