final project

I had students work in groups of 2 or 3 to work out complex composite area problems. In years past, I would give them a few minutes in class to work out the problem, and then go up to the SMART Board to present how to find the area. What I found is that students didn't have enough time to prepare, and this lack of preparation made them very nervous about presenting in front of the class. I would usually have to correct their mistakes and teach the problem anyway.

To correct this, I thought it would be a good idea for them to work on the problem outside of class, giving them plenty of time to prepare, and then present the next day. A lot of students would come in unprepared because they didn't have time, or forgot to meet. Once again, I would usually wind up teaching the problems.

This year, I had the groups make a recording of their work using SMART recorder. We spent a day in the computer lab making the videos. This gave students plenty of time to plan out what they were doing. Also, using SMART Recorder allowed them to present their work in a non-stessful setting. If they wanted to press pause to gather themselves, or even start over, they had that option. This made the quality of presentation much better. Each class had 10 problems to present. Each video was anywhere from 2-4 minutes long. We had plenty of time to show all 10 videos. Students took notes from the videos. We could easily replay part of the video if anyone missed something. One of the best parts about this was that the videos were uploaded to the public drive, so that any student could access the videos on their own time using their account. Since I was giving a quiz the next day, I know that many students watched videos of the problems they needed help with.

I think next year I'm going to try having student use Voicethread for this. I think it would be neat for students to create video commentaries on each others presentation. I didn't have a great experience with VoiceThread, but if I work with it a little over the summer, I'm confident that I can figure it out. Great experience!

Click here, and then click on "student composite area video" to see an example

Other Tools

What a great resource for us to use! I am extremely overwhelmed by all the technology out there, but this really helps to simplify things. The first tool I found was What2Learn. This site has pre-made quizzes, as well as the option to create your own quizzes. It creates the quizzes in a fun, game-like format. This would be a great tool to use when reviewing for a quiz or test. I've found that students perform much better on assessements when the info. is reviewed in game format.
The second tool I found was Chart Tool. This site allows you to easily create a variety of charts and graphs. This is perfect for any math classroom, and could be used in any form of a graphing project.
The third tool I found useful was Poll Daddy (not to be confused with Go Daddy). This site can be used to create surveys and polls. Teachers could use this to collect anonymous information from students. Students could use this for collecting data for a project. Student Councils could use this to collect data from the student body. Administration could use this as a means to boost student moral. There are an infinite number of ways that this could be use.
I will definitely add "Cool Tools for Schools" to my Favorites, and post it to my website for students for use.

Wordle

I really like these! I had fun playing around with it. I created one from Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1933 Inagural address ("Nothing to Fear except Fear itself"), and Martin Luther King Jr's " I have a dream" speech. It was interesting to see what words were used the most. What I found myself doing was rereading the speech carefully, looking for these words. How powerful that would be if we could get kids to do the same thing!

This has great classroom uses. Any time an historical figure is studied, a Wordle could be created from their speeches. I think this would help students get to know and understand that figure better. Neat idea!

Diigo

I set up my Diigo account. I downloaded the Diigo toolbar on my computer at home. I "applied" to join the 21st century group, and am waiting to be accepted. That was six hours ago. I would have liked to have had this done today; this is a little frustrating. To be continued...

Just checked to see if I've been accepted... Nope. Still waiting. It's been 24 hours now.

I have been accepted by the group! My self-esteem has been restored. Highlighting and adding sticky notes was easy. I can definitley see how Diigo would help students who are working together on a research project. It would also be great for a teacher to see documented evidence that students are in fact doing research.

Diigo kind of reminds me of buying used books in college. Used books were not only nice because they were cheaper, they were also nice because they had been previously highlighted. Diigo can save you from having to read an entire web page if somebody before you had highlighted, and placed sticky notes already. It is a very useful too.

Digital Storytelling

I used Animoto to create the embedded video below. I had a lot of fun doing this. There was a bit of a learning curve, but it was worthwhile. I'm honestly having a difficult time thinking of how I could use this in my math class, without it taking a lot of time away from teaching Ohio Academic Content standards. I can definitely see how it would be beneficial in other subjects that require students to give presentations. I think it would be cool for L.A. students to create a "movie trailer" type presentation for summarizing a novel. Social Studies students could prepare a video presentation on a historical figure. The possibilities are truly endless. Students would no doubt enjoy using this for school purposes.

Wiki Assignment

I created a Wiki for an upcoming kayak trip in June. The video tutorial inspired me to do so. The video mentioned problems that I've ran into trying to communicate via email and by phone. I created a page for listing items that we need and have (much like the video), one for a list of possible supplies, one for directions, and internet links to a river map, camground, and the outfitters. So I made a Wiki and invited the five guys I'll be going with. They'll probably make fun of me, and call me names for getting geeky, but it might save us some trouble.

I honestly can't remember what Google Docs was like; much like this I think. I imagine more people already have Google accounts, than one for this Wiki site. Though, setting up an account was not that hard. I remember that Google Docs allowed you to upload files directly into it. I don't think a Wiki page will do that. I had to copy and paste one of my files into the Wiki. Google Docs also allowed you to draw; I don't think you could do that in Wiki?

I think this would be a good site to post a problem of the week, and give students a place to discuss it. It might also be a good place for students to help each other with homework. Students could use it as a place to gather survey data for a project. I'm sure there are lots of other math applications out there. Cool site!

Google Reader

Just finished creating my Google Reader account. It was easy to set up; the video tutorial was very helpful. This is nice in that you don't have to go searching for updated information when instead, it's all "delivered" to you. I used Google's News and Sports pre-made bundles, and also subscribed to Ohio Department of Ed., National Council for Teachers of Mathematics, and Ohio Council for Teachers of Mathematics. I subscribed to the latter because I will get updated info. on creative ideas for lessons, and get info. on upcoming conferences and workshops. Great idea!