Math 371 Technology for STEM Educators

If I were asked to describe my ideal classroom at the beginning of PS1 last fall, I would have portrayed a room with tables instead of desks, a smart board in front of the class, lots of visual and physical manipulatives, a no calculator rule—like in the Calculus sequence at SDSU, and most importantly me in front of the class lecturing each day with fully engaged students.   As we learned about different teaching methods, I was constantly saying to myself, “I understand how this method would work for English or history but not math.   By the end of the 2015 fall semester, I had developed a few ideas that would differentiate my lessons, but I was still stubbornly holding on to the idea of the traditional math classroom. Now when I think about my ideal classroom, most of the physical aspects are the same, but my approach to teaching is much different.   I realized how stubborn I was being about how math should be taught, so now I am forcing myself to become more aware ...

The closer I get to graduation, the more I wonder and worry how I am going to be able to find a good balance in my life when I start teaching. This semester has been especially hard to keep my head afloat between classes, work, family, friends and relationships. Teachers in South Dakota often have to have a second job to maintain a reasonable income. I want to stay in South Dakota to teach but I don't know how I will be able to keep a healthy balance between school, work, and life. Something that we have talked a lot about in various classes is how to maintain a healthy balance.  One of the things that have been suggested is to have a day where you disconnect completely from work and/or school. My question is, how do you disconnect when there is always something that needs to be done or someone who needs to talk to you. I have a hard time disconnecting with taking seven classes and working two jobs. When I'm not working I'm doing homework and when I'm not doing homewo...

            In this day and age, we as a society are rather accustomed to using technology on a daily basis. But what if we are using it too much? Have we become too used to living life with and relying on advanced technology such as computers, cell phones, or even graphing calculators? Perhaps. Or, perhaps it is simply because we are misusing it.             As educators, we must be aware of the fine line that differentiates applying technology in a suitable way in the classroom from misusing, or overusing, it. For instance, schools that have the ability of being one-to-one, where each student has their own iPad or tablet, are phenomenal; the abundance of resources as a result of being one-to-one has the potential to be beyond influential and beneficial to students’ academic lives. However, I feel as though this availability to such technology can be easily misused. Thus...

                     This past summer I was able to attend the REMAST summer conference. I was so grateful for the experience because I was introduced to so many new ideas, both good and bad. One that truly stuck out to me was the new idea of having virtual teachers in a classroom, while a monitor supervises. The idea can be considered both bad and good. Some think this is an amazing new way of using technology and reaching out to students all over the state. While others think this is a sad new way of going about educating our students in South Dakota. After learning about this new idea, that some schools are considering, it made my desire to become an educator really prosper.                 At the conference we were shown the new big idea that is going into school systems. An IPad which is hooked to a stand, has the ability to roll around a classroom a...

It is the 21 st century and everything around us is going digital. Almost all of our important information anymore is kept in some kind of a computer, electronic text, or cloud based format. This includes everything from the photos from your last vacation to the emails and documents we use on a daily basis. School districts are no different. More and more of them are turning to more electronic means of storage, teaching, and learning. Some schools are now even completely online! But is this really the best thing for the students? Is there any real benefit for things like textbooks to be online? I simply say no, it does not always benefit the students and here’s why: The idea of books being online is great in theory. There is less paper and it’s cheaper because books get worn down and stuff happens to them. The online versions cost less and give students the same information etc. etc. But guess what students don’t learn near as well reading off of a computer screen!! Students...