Math 371 Technology for STEM Educators

It is the final week of classes so it is my turn to write the blog post—unfortunately it will be the last post until January 2014.   I will continue this blog the next time the course is offered. This is the first time that I have taught this course by myself.   Recently someone said that a teacher should ask “what have they learned?” rather than “what have I taught?”   This class is definitely a good class to ask the first question since I don’t think that I have really taught my students anything.   However, I am fairly certain that they have learned lots of things.   So, with their permission, here are their answers to the question, “what have they learned in Math 371?” From Leanne Holdorf: Of all my classes this semester, Math 371 is by far my favorite. I was able to dabble in technology that I didn't think I'd have access to for a while. We explored different programs and applications that will help me as a teacher. And I really started t...

As I sit here typing on the mini iPad provided by the math department for the semester, I have begun to realize just how easy it is to join the network with one tap by my finger. Of course, the World Wide Web is not my only network. As teachers, we are privy to an incredible amount of resources by just being who we are! From having classes with peers in the same education program to being members of national clubs such as the National Education Association, we have a network more valuable than many of us really understand until much later in our careers. To really put this into perspective, a few weeks ago on an online program, I was able to have a conversation about flipped instruction, one-to-one schools, and Common Core with a high school math teacher in California. As a soon to be teacher, I was eager to hear what he had to share about his many years of teaching. Not only did I learn from him but he learned from me! The network and flow of information does not only go from older ...

I read the article “Mathematics Education: A Way Forward” by David Wees, , http://www.edutopia.org/blog/mathematics-real-world-curriculum-david-wees and it started with the equation:   Population × Bad curriculum   Multiple generations   = Functionally innumerate population. Which is such a true statement, that we don’t always think about. The adult population, of American as well as Canada, has a generally bad experience with math. Not only was it a boring subject in school, they were also told by their parents that it is okay to hate math . I believe that it is critical that we realize that as a society Americans don’t like math, as future and current math teachers we need to foster an environment where it is easy to like math. Though this article is about Canadian math education, I think it applies to American math education as well. This article focuses on three ways to make math more enjoyable and beneficial to society. The three ways are: changing the curric...

     So often, students evaluate problems by following the steps their secondary Math teachers told them to follow, but never actually realize why they are doing it. I am guilty of doing this. Last week, I was tutoring a student on factoring by grouping, and I just realized what we are really doing when we factor. For example, when you are given the following equation: We look at the first two terms and factor out the GCF (greatest common factor). Then we do the same process for the last two terms. Now, the (x+2) becomes a factor and then the remaining terms become the other factor of (3x^2+4). That is how we got the last line, but what I realized last week was that we actually factor out the GCF again. This time the GCF is (x+2) and then (3x^2+4) is what is left after you factor out the GCF, and this is how you get your two factors by grouping. I never realized that we were actually just factoring out the GCF again. I just always thought if the two ( ) were the same ...

As a future teacher, I constantly have the same thoughts reappear in my head. "Should I use this technology or that technology?" "Which app is best for this task?" "What activity would be best for this lesson?"  Seriously, how do you really know?  I have finally come to the realization that at some point you simply have to let loose and go with what you feel.  Yes, it is important as a teacher to do your research to make sure you don't pick a "dud" app or do an activity that doesn't apply to the lesson.  I am simply saying that I am not going to exhaust my time finding out every little detail. I am already dreading the first year I actually start teaching.  I know that my 8 hour school day will turn into a 12+ hour work day.  That's just the simple fact of being a first year teacher (or any teacher).  Thus, my time needs to be spent on preparing the lesson and not debating on how to teach it.  With that said, I can expect to fail.  ...

MOOCS have become increasingly popular over the years.  I think these courses resemble flipped instruction in the way that they are lectures online.  The students can access them whenever they want and can watch the lecture numerous times so they can understand the material.  This can be extremely helpful for some students.  There can be as many as 15,000 students enrolled in one class learning from one teacher.  They may be able to contact each other and help each other with the material.  To me, Khan Academy is similar to MOOCS also, except that it is not a class.  It provides students with videos that run through examples in many classes in science and math.  Also, MOOCS=$FREE.  How can any college student go wrong with that?  With the rising costs of college tuition, students look for any way to get anything for free.  I know I would take a MOOC, if they actually counted for college credit.  I believe some college students ...

Throughout this course and throughout this blog, we have identified several reasons why technology should be used in a math classroom. These reasons have been anything from increasing student engagement, to more individualized education, to the availability of millions of different educational tools in the palm of your hand. All of these reasons highlight the overwhelming positives of having technology in the classroom. However, I really think if I had to sum it all up into one reason, I would say that educational technology levels the playing field. What I mean when I say that it levels the playing field is that it allows all parties involved to have the same opportunities of anyone else in education. This includes students, teachers, parents, administrators, and the general public. I will go into more depth on some of these. The most important of all the people educational technology affects is, of course, the students. Educational technology has opened new doors to coun...

All semester in the Math Technology class I have been telling students that the most important quality to have as a teacher is to be flexible.   This is probably even more important with all of the latest technology.   We all know that technology doesn’t always work so you need to be flexible and handle a hiccup in your plan well.   Of course, this means that you should probably always have a back-up plan. As I am approaching the end of my 20 th year of teaching, another quality that I think is very important to have is humility.   I am pretty certain that I didn’t always have a lot of that in my early years of teaching, and I don’t think that I was a very good teacher then.   While it is essential to be the content expert in your classroom, you should not take that as a ticket to be arrogant.   There is a difference between confidence and arrogance.   Think back to any teachers that you had that you disliked; do they have anything in common?...

For quite some time, I have thought about how I will be able to engage my students in learning. It seems that many students do not want to participate or try in math classes because of one reason or another. Too often I hear people say that they are "just not good at math" or that they cannot "do math" because their parents were not good at it. I want to make sure my students do not have that mindset. To me, it seems that there is a difference in the way people think about math versus other subjects. In my experience, people believe that there are two types of students: those who can do math and those who cannot. Of course, I do not believe this. I believe that everyone can "do math" as long as they put some effort into it. Whenever I think about the different learning styles and when people say that math is not their subject, I think about how it's different than other subjects. Math is just another subject in school. Sure it has to deal with number...

   Wow! Looking at the Common Core Standards there is a lot of "stuff" that we are going to be required to teach our students in a short amount of time. In some schools, teachers will be required to teach twice the amount of information in the same amount of time that they were given before the new standards. On top of having more to cover in the same amount of time, we will be evaluated on how well our students do on the Smarter Balance test that covers the Common Core Standards. It is quite overwhelming! In this blog, I am going to talk about some of the things I am worried about with the standards, and some of the reasons why I am glad we are all switching to common standards.    First of all, I will talk briefly about what I am worried about with the new standards. Like many, I am worried about not having enough time to teach everything, and I don't want to have to make the decision to leave something out when everything is equally important. There ar...

     So I googled "math education" to see if any interesting blogs popped up, and honestly I was surprised. There were so many instant results that simply criticized  math education and didn't offer any realistic solution. The first one I read I couldn't even finish, it referred to math as soul crushing and I just couldn't keep reading that article.      The next article I read wasn't quite so, let's say 'mean spirited' toward math education but still highly critical. Here's the link: http://www.computerbasedmath.org/  . On the FAQs page it talks about how as teachers we only teach "computing" and not enough mathematical thinking, they suggest using computers to replace the hand calculations. But they do not take into account that computers, calculators, or any other technology that solves math for a student doesn't help them understand the "mathematical thinking" for that question.      The article suggests that l...

In this article by Howard Pitler, he shares data gathered by McREL, which has a classroom tool called Power Walkthrough.  They gathered information from more than 60,000 classrooms that use this tool.  They went into classrooms to see what kinds of technology were being used and how often they were used by both teachers and students.  Graphing calculators, interactive whiteboards, document cameras, online software, and many other similar technologies were recorded.  If any of these technologies were used even briefly, they recorded the classroom as having used technology.  Their studies revealed that in 63 percent of their observations of teachers, no technology was utilized.  This number increased to 73 percent for students utilizing no technology. In an era where emphasis has been put into using technology to educate our students, these numbers seem appalling.  In many of these situations, the teachers had easy access to use technology.  ...

The article "Whiteboards for Dummies" was very interesting because I did not know that there was that many things you could do with an interactive whiteboard.  The teacher in the article plays a game with his students where they get to throw a koosh ball at the board and then questions pop up when they hit certain objects.  He uses this to help them with their vocab words.  I think this is a great way for his students to actively learn in his classroom.  It makes learning fun and interactive and the technology is used to it's full potential.  Sometimes technology can hinder the learning process if it is used incorrectly, and this activity definitely does the opposite.  The students get more engaged because this is a complete new way of learning their vocab words other than the standard way of  writing them down and defining them.   The students get to associate images with the words and get asked questions about each word.  The article also a...

Link: Board of Remediation 1. The website features an idea to help students with lower level concepts. If students are struggling with basic concepts that were covered in previous classes below their current class, they can go to the wall and pick out a worksheet to help understand those lower level concepts. 2. Using this on-the-wall system, students can grab any worksheets they want or need and complete them on their own time rather than having the entire class use teaching time to refresh lower-level concepts. There is also a binder of answer keys to each worksheet next to the wall. 3. The website was helpful because it gave me an idea that I could possibly use in the future if I see that my students do not understand concepts that they should have mastered. 4. Yes, I would  use this idea. I think it would be a great way to get students into the idea of practicing what they don't know. This way, they can see where they need to improve and make the move to actually improv...

Continuous Everywhere, but Differentiable Nowhere The content is comprised of either motivational “keep your chin up” posts or projects/activities dealing                mostly with upper level high school math (pre calc and calc).  Most of the projects or activities that he posts deal with technology, so I feel like if you are teaching calc or anything calc related, there could be some cool things to take form this blog.   I think some of the activities look really interesting, but I believe the blog is only really helpful if you are teaching upper level high school math.  With the activities and the motivational posts. I know some days will be tough, so this could help keep me going.  Possibly. Probably not as a beginning teacher, as I will be swamped just trying to survive. Maybe as I become more of a veteran and feel that I have valuable things to share I will get into it. Crafty Math 1     Mostly ti...

Mathtwitterblogosphere This site is dedicated to a group of math teachers who use twitter and who blog.   They have formed a community and share ideas with each other.   They have become friends.   It is a place to get great ideas and share great ideas with other math teachers. It is important as a teacher to get new ideas and one of the best ways to do this is to follow other math teachers on Twitter and read other math teachers’ blogs.   Maybe someday you will be one of the math teachers that people are following and getting ideas from—how cool would that be? There is a list of suggested people to follow, based on their interest areas.   This is going to be helpful and provide me some new blogs to watch and people to follow on Twitter. There was some great advice on privacy concerns on Twitter and with Blogging. One of the best pages was “Cool Things we have done together.”  This is a great resource of people to follo...