Tuesday, March 8, 2016

Math and Educational Technology


Lately, we've shared a lot of “big picture” blogs with you, so this week, we narrowed our focus to one content area.  In coming weeks, we’ll focus on other content areas one at a time.  First up, MATH!  In the post below, you’ll find tools, resources, and ideas related to math and educational technology*.




TOOLS

Many teachers at Warrior Run use Kahoot to check for understanding at various points.  Here are the top 5 tips for creating a math Kahoot.

A Google Add-On for Docs, Sheets, and now Forms, g(Math) allows you “create  rich math expressions and graphs for direct insertion into Google Doc, Sheet, or Form.”  A recent update includes handwriting and voice entry!

If you would like your students to have access to any of these, just email Greg.



RESOURCES

Watch videos and practice skills for almost any math subject.  Subjects begin at early math and arithmetic, and move through algebra, geometry, calculus, probability and statistics, and beyond.  Teachers and students can create accounts with their Google single sign on.

Students will demonstrate mastery by answering X questions correctly, responding on average in under Y seconds, and answering at least Z percent correctly without using a built-in hint.  Shmoop offers accounts for teachers and students through Google single sign on.

Here are two more articles which explain and link to several excellent edtech tools made especially for the math classroom.




IDEAS

Students Further Their Own Learning
In this article, a teacher asks his students to find videos on a concept (in this case, probability) that are under four minutes.  He asks them to share the video in a simple Google Form, and in the process, they learn more about a specific concept, criteria to discuss the video’s effect, and how to locate information.

Students + Screencasts = Math Review Archive
Think about your final exam, and the review sessions you have traditionally done with your students.  What if you gave the students more responsibility?  Assign a student (or pair of students) a particular concept or problem.  Ask them to explain it to the class in a screencast.  They could use g(Math) in a Google Doc to show their work, while using their voices to explain the process.  Most screencast tools save to Google Drive, so sharing is pretty easy.  They could add them to Google Classroom or you could upload them to a website or your YouTube Channel**.  Here is an example of one teacher’s Algebra class notes.

Use Twitter as a Global Learning Network
Twitter has become pretty popular with teachers at Warrior Run -- I can think of at least two math teachers who use it regularly to communicate with their students.  What if you used it to connect with other students, other schools, other states, other countries?  Check out 8 ways (other) math teachers are using Twitter.




* Please note, just because technology is new, doesn’t mean it’s always better.  If traditional flashcards work for you and your students, keep using them!  But if StudyBlue could work for you, ask some of your kids to give it a whirl.

** We all have YouTube accounts connected to our WRSD Google accounts.

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