Math 371 Technology for STEM Educators

When I was a student I probably asked the question why? too many times in a day. Sometimes, in math especially, the teacher could give me the answer to that question and I would still not understand (I’m looking at you, π, who decided what you were?) But there is an important tool teachers have at their fingertips to answer some of these questions. Why is a circle 360 degrees?   Because the Babylonians and other ancient cultures used a number system based on 60, and degrees is left over from that mathematical tradition. Why does the Pythagorean Theorem work, and…who was Pythagoras?   Well, Pythagoras was a Greek mathematician, and his proof using geometry proves this algebraic equation in a different way than showing them the equation does . Why do we need math?   There’s so many historical answers to this question. Point to the computer scientists and mathematicians that made it possible to go to the moon and have the computers we have today. Point to any of the ...

     Thinking back to the days of elementary, middle and high school, I remember many of my teachers. All of them I would be able to recognize, some I would be able to recall their names, and still others I remember the class they taught and some important things I learned. The last teachers I mentioned have clear memories that define them as my favorite teachers, but hold the phone, why do I remember these teachers? What features or experiences did I have with them to hold this memory? After some thought, I discovered that every teacher I remember either guided me to a new way of thinking or motivated me through the way they taught.       One of the most noteworthy teachers I had was in elementary school. She was my first-grade teacher that also taught second grade, and she was the teacher that recognized my skills in math. I still remember the day that she asked me to join the second-grade lesson and all the other second graders ...

Stop Boring Students As a big sister, a tutor, and a nanny I am no stranger to helping with homework. I have helped in all types of classes. One thing I have noticed is that the person I am helping always seems uninterested. It is not that they do not really understand, but instead they just do not want to do it. Another thing I have noticed is that I always was a nd am helping with worksheets or problems out of the book,  and have never been asked to assist someone on a project, study for an exam or help with a paper . After a discussion in class I have begun to realize that the students understand what they are doing, they are simply just bored and tired of repetition. Handing out worksheets and book problems are boring, never seem fun and by default students can become uninterested . Believe me, even some of the best students will become bored and unintrigued, and instead of changing it up, teachers continue to assign the same generic things. Once a student is bo...

Ed Camp 2017             Just this past weekend I had the privilege of attending my first ever Ed Camp here in Brookings, SD. I had many people tell me that you won’t regret going and they were correct. For those of you that don’t know what Ed Camp is, Ed Camp is a day of self-driven, high-interest professional development. It is a day to collaborate with teachers and future teachers of all grade levels. The best part is that you as participators get to choose the topics that are discussed that day. After a short introduction, you are asked to write down on a piece of paper what topics and ideas you want to discuss with other teachers. All of the ideas are then collaborated and you as a teacher participate to facilitate the discussion within the room. There are no presenters or power points, it is simply just teachers wanting to learn more from other fellow teachers.          ...

So quite recently Taylor gave a talk in class about gamification in the classroom, and I was actually quite surprised. It seems as if I was used to a completely different concept of gamification than what Taylor presented to the class. It is not entirely strange that there exist two different definitions of gamification, and it did allow me to grow more used to the idea of gamification in the classroom. Before I talk about the new ideas that I have thought of for gamification I’ll take a few sentences to explain the differences in what I thought to what Taylor knew. My thought of gamification was of applying the concepts of a game to the classroom. I’ll just start making analogies to World of Warcraft because it boils down game mechanics to their base state. In World of Warcraft you do quests, kill creatures and explore a world all for many different reasons. In the essence of World of Warcraft everything you do is to level up, all of the tasks are just to get the “ding” ...