World-Shaker

ucresearch:

Watch the full video: Blossoming into Science with actress Mayim Bialik

A fantastic video for girls interested in STEM (4:14 runtime)

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Ten Disturbing New Facts About Math Textbooks

Some quick takeaways from the survey (via Edudemic):

• About half (49%) of teachers surveyed believe their textbooks are ineffective for English Language Learners.
• Nearly all (89%) of K-8 math teachers say they need to supplement their text with additional materials because they’re so inadequate.
• The most widely used textbook is also the lowest rated.
• 4 out of 5 (82%) teachers feel compelled to create their own / borrow materials from other teachers.

Some simple foldable ideas for your math class.

(via Runde’s Room: Math Journal Sundays)

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An awesome and simple little teaching tool over at Teacher Tipster’s Facebook page!

(look for “Teacher Tipster” on Facebook if this link doesn’t work; it’s in the recent wall photos)

Equation Editor in Google Docs means that anyone with a computer that can go online is able to do his or her math work in a word processor. The built in equation editor is easy to use, and offers a convenient way of inserting mathematical notation and maths symbols into a document. Perhaps the only thing that would make this equation editor more useful would be keyboard shortcuts for each of the symbols.

(via Math in Google Docs with Built-in “Equation Editor” | Free Resources from the Net for EVERY Learner)

A Sizable Directory of Math Education Resources for Elementary Students →

Not much else to say actually.

Ways to Hook Kids with Math →

Here are the first two:

1. Don’t start with the Math. The teachers have discussed how many students shut down if you start with the math. Rather than introducing formulas, vocabulary terms, and numbers, start with problems, puzzles, and situations. Rather than using the problem to practice math – introduce a problem that requires math to solve it.

2. Try to avoid text-only problems. Some students struggle to start a math problem because of difficulties with langauge.  Where possible, start with images, videos, manipulates or hands-on introductions to the math.  Chunking out the sub-questions or giving them one at a time isn’t really a solution – find ways to get rid of the written language completely. Dan Meyer‘s name has come up many times as the master of this.

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jbizzle329:

Currently making Math Jenga. I thought it would be fun for the kids on game day.

They will be practicing simple number facts, skip counting, and multiples.

I hope it turns out well!

*I got the idea from my Drinking Jenga game

Edit: adding place value, money, and time telling

I love it. As long as the students aren’t drinking.

Interactive Exploration of a Dynamical System

(by Bret Victor)

We hear a lot of design manifestos around here. But Bret Victor’s stuck out: He wants to kill math. He’s no Luddite, though — he thinks mathematics is one of the most powerful, transcendent ways humans have for understanding and changing the world. What he wants to kill is math’s interface: opaque, abstract, unfamiliar, hard. “The power to understand and predict the quantities of the world should not be restricted to those with a freakish knack for manipulating abstract symbols,” he writes. Now he’s created a prototype iPad interface that turns differential equations into something that doesn’t feel math-ey at all: visual, intuitive, and touchable.

discovered via FastCodeDesign.com

Mobile Learning Proves to Benefit At-Risk Students →

These are some of the results from a mobile learning program for at-risk high schoolers. Pretty impressive I’d say. Click through for more information.

• 90 percent of the Project K-Nect students in Algebra I and 100 percent of the Algebra II students demonstrated proficiency on their end of course exams.

• By the end of the fall 2010 semester, 89 percent of the Algebra I students reported they are more motivated to learn math compared to 76 percent at the beginning of the semester.
• The majority of students reported they are also more comfortable learning math (83 percent), felt more successful (72 percent) and better prepared to take the end-of course exam (72 percent).

kbkonnected:

Just a little more Lego love. This time for math.

#kinderchat #elemchat #spedchat #mathchat

…why…why didn’t I think of this?

What Successful Math Students Do →

Before the end of the school year I had a discussion with a mum who asked what her child could do in order to continue to be successful in math (e.g. “successful” in a very general, “life skills” sense). “Sam” had always struggled with math and had finally reached a place where she felt successful. Yay!

Mum and I had a great chat, and together (together in the true sense of the word as she had many excellent ideas as well) we came up with the following list of suggestions.
& so … If you had been a fly on my classroom wall you would have seen two women, working together, creating & building on the ideas of one another for the child.

(The Bonus: In the end I feel that I benefited as much as they did.)

This is a really great collection of advice for you to click through to. I strongly recommend it.

By the way—I really feel like there’s not a lot of content on here for Math teachers. What tags are you using? Who do you follow that really hits into math?

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gjmueller:

Enter Desmos, a startup out of Connecticut, that has built a graphing calculator alternative that may shake up the industry on two key fronts: it’s Web-based, and it’s free.

Do we need students to spend $100 on a graphic calculator?

So much potential—if only it worked in HTML5 instead of Flash. Then it’d be available on the over 200 million iOS devices out there. There’s always this app for less than $2. Still much cheaper than my old TI-83 Plus.

matthen:

A geometric construction of the parabola. The blue point is called the focus, and the horizontal line is the directrix. The blue lines show all the points which are at an equal distance from the red point and the blue focus point. The point of the blue line directly above the red dot contributes to the parabolic curve, because the parabola is defined as the set of all points equidistant to the focus and the directrix. [more] [code]

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Now you’re thinking with Portals!