In her years at La Salle, Math Department Chair Ms. Kathleen Jahn shares how she has created a personal structure for her classes, showing her unique, community-centered education style.

Through her guidance, students have the opportunity to explore real-world math from the safety of a white board, a practice which she said she has seen spreading across the school with benefits toward studying and communal learning.

Her career has allowed her to teach at both the middle and high school levels, and in both public and private schools. Through these positions, especially her time in Franciscan Montessori Earth School, she developed educational tools to benefit her students’ learning.

Because of her experience teaching math alongside other teachers, she sees the similarities between teaching math and language material. She explained that both are skills-based courses, and have important real-world applications.

“I have a lot more conversations with Madame Barker about teaching approaches and how to apply skills you learn in math or in French, and do an application to something more real, more connected to the real world,” Ms. Jahn said.

Coming into teaching, she originally viewed her high school students as young adults, yet through her time in different schools, she has realized that they are still kids — kids who need support, patience, and second chances.

One of her AP Calculus AB students, sophomore Maya Calik, described Ms. Jahn’s study habits as helpful, referring to her unique test-prep strategies through active recall and journaling.

“In Ms. Jahn’s class, there isn’t really a study guide that’s a document … and I think that was really helpful because it’s kind of like active recall,” Calik said.

In addition, she explained how she implements a flipped style of teaching, where students are encouraged to try a problem by themselves before they come together as a class to discuss the proper skills needed to solve it.

“It’s a story first, so let’s build the tools to address a real question, and it’s often sort of real-world data,” Ms. Jahn said.

This approach allows the students to explore problems head on and develop critical thinking on their own before coming back with the rest of the class.

“I try not to speak to the class as though they were all one person, and that’s why I prefer a student centered approach, and why I think that people learn by doing best,” Ms. Jahn said.