Math

[The Innovative Educator]

Please share comments, thoughts, suggestions and ideas about enhancing teaching and learning in math.

[Chris Burwell]

You know, I am not a math person so it is hard for me to motivate these folks. The math teachers in my building are the most reluctant group I have. The feeling seems to be that the students will not have the benefits of the computer on the test, so it is not worth using them. I do have to say though, the one teacher who used them the most ( a lot, actually) had the greatest increase in test scores last year. She entered the year with her seventh grader honors class having about 5 Level 4 students (we are a low performing school) and ended up with 14 Level 4's. You can't chalk them all up to coincidence. In this day and age when teachers are judged by 'value added', that seems to be a lot of value to me. Anyone have any ideas on how to get the rest of them on board?

[The Innovative Educator]

Chris,

Thank you for sharing this. Last year when I visited IS 93 they attributed their math score rise to the access to technology. What they said was, although it's true that our 20th century assessments do not allow technology, the tools available like Geometers Sketchpad and virtual manipulatives helped bring math concepts to life to students in ways that would not be possible without technology. As a result they were able to do better on the tests. And, of course, the harder pitch is that we should be teaching students in their world and for the world they will graduate into rather than the world of out-of-touch test creators. But for those focusing on that, as you have also witnessed tech tools can help them as well.

I wonder how others have found students of tech-rich classrooms perform on tests and in general???

[Keith Elgart]

For those of you teaching math that have a SMART Board in your room (or access to one in your building), you may want to sign up for the Beta Testing of the SMART Notebook Math Edition being released soon. Follow the link below to sign up.

http://tequipment.com/smart-notebook-math/

Basically you'll have some great interactive tools, you'll have a true equation editor and recognizer that can recognize your handwritten math equations and symbols and will actually solve the problem (if you'd like it to do so). You'll also have a built in TI emulator built-in, so you wont have to launch a separate TI calculator (software), it'll launch right inside Notebook... follow the link that was posted above for more info and to sign up to participate in the free beta.

[Maria Fleyshgakker]

I can tell you another story :) a few years ago a math teacher at a middle school smashed a calculator over a wall, my daughter witnessed that. I think he didn't know what to teach the kids if they didn't need to calculate :)
Typical misunderstanding: too many people think that math is just a lot of calculations.
Are you a member of the math group? we can continue this discussion in more details there.
Oh, wait, there is another aspect: do you think, it is possible, that the reforms DOE is implementing will bring more young teachers who are more "native" to using the computers, cameras, etc.? Is it possible that by forcing the old teachers out Bloomberg and Klein will automatically increase the use of technology in the classrooms?
I am not trying to insult anybody here I am an old teacher myself :( but I see the positive not just negative in the fact that it’s hard for me to find a job now.

[PNaugle]

My math students are participating in Earth Day Groceries Project as a way of honoring Earth Day on April 22. Since we are on our spring break this coming week, we started decorating the bundle of bags we got from our local grocer before we went on our break. I will deliver the bags back to the store on April 21 so they have them in time for Earth Day.

My students had to write two word problems about recycling or the project and make PowerPoint slides. I am editing the slides together for one PowerPoint collection to show parents during a showcase night.