Saturday, February 21, 2009

Map Mashups for Geometry

I created a map mashup that could be used in the Geometry course (mostly 9th graders) that I am currently placed in.
View Larger Map

This map has various landmarks throughout the world that are made from the three-dimensional objects that my students are familiar with. As you click on each marker, a picture pops up with some information on the landmark, followed by some questions. Some of these questions ask students to identify the three-dimensional figure, view the figure from various angles, calculate area or perimeter, etc. I think that this activity will keep students interested because these are landmarks that they may/may not be familiar with. This map shows how they can apply their geometrical knowledge to things outside of the classroom. I think an interesting addition to this activity would be to have students create their own marker with a landmark of their choice. Then they could post information and come up with their own questions and answer them.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Organizing the Internet for Unit Plans

I am working on a unit that covers Area & Perimeter for a Geometry course. Most of the students in my class are in 9th grade, however, there are some older students as well.

This unit will accomplish the following GLCE and METS:

G2.1 Relationships between Area and Volume Formulas
G2.1.1 Know and demonstrate the relationships between the area formula of a triangle, the area formula of a parallelogram, and the area formula of a trapezoid.
G2.1.2 Know and demonstrate the relationships between the area formulas of various quadrilaterals.


3. Have access to and utilize assistive technology tools.

4. Collaborate in content-related projects that integrate a variety of media (e.g. print, audio, video, graphic, simulations, and models) with presentation, work processing, publishing, database, graphics design, or spreadsheet applications.

I have found several websites that will be helpful for this unit. I have created a delicious accounted and organized this websites under the tag geometry. Some of the websites under this tag are not for this unit, but are websites that I have used previously in the class.


The first website I looked at was a Shodor Interactive website called Shape Explorer. I frequently go use Shodor Interactive because it has a lot of websites for discovering Geometry properties. This particular website has the student calculating the area and the perimeter of various shapes. The shapes are on a grid so they can count the squares, or they can apply some of the formulas. The student can type in an answer and website checks the answer. I like this website because it has lots of different shapes instead of the usual square, triangle, rectangle, etc. I also like this website because it keeps a list of all of the areas and perimeters that have been calculated so that you can compare the two measurements.


The next website is a game called Shape Surveyor. This is a game where students calculate either area or perimeter of various shapes. I like this game because you can choose the difficulty at the beginning of the game. This way students who do not feel as comfortable with the material can choose a lower level while other students can do more challenging levels if they please. I do not know how much "fun" this game really is, but it is a good way to check understanding.


I included a website called Area and Perimeter. This website walks students through the properties of area and perimeter and how to find each one. It's very colorful, looks fun, and it has student clicking on different shapes and pictures to learn about area and perimeter. It is a lot more entertaining than reading this information from a book and it is presented in an easy to remember way. It also has students "check" their understanding as the go through the website.


There are two more websites from Shodor Interactive. One of them is Perimeter Explorer and the other is Area Explorer. These websites have some fairly complicated shapes placed on a grid and the object is to find the perimeter or area of each of the shapes. The students can simply count the squares or they can break up the shapes and apply the formulas. There is a button where you can show the outline of the shape. This makes it easy for the student to calculate the area of a larger square and then subtract out the missing pieces. A lot of times students are sent home with homework that asks them to do the same exact thing. I think I would have students calculate the area and perimeter for 10 different shapes on this website as homework instead.



Sunday, February 8, 2009

Using RSS Feeds

I was recently introduced to RSS feeds. I had heard about them before, but had never actually tried using them. Honestly, I was not sure how useful they were going to be at first.

I decided to use them for my professional development. One thing that I want to accomplish in my teaching is to make students see that mathematics is relevant to their world. I want their learning to match the kind of mathematics that they will be doing in the real world. I would like to see that the material is applicable to situations outside of the classroom. I created a folder using Google Reader titled Math News & Information. I have added and will be continuing to add sites that have up to date information on how mathematics is being used in the real world. I can share the news with my students and show them how important mathematics is. I also created a folder titled Education News & Information. The sites I included in this folder has teaching tips, information about curriculum, teaching policies, etc. I can take different things I learn using these feeds and apply them to my teaching.

Sunday, February 1, 2009

Creating a Web Portfolio

Today, I Googled myself and a few sites came up. I first typed in Kimberly and the first two websites were from the College of Education here at MSU, announcing scholarships that I had received. The next website was alumniclass.com and it gave my class and high school I graduated from. When I Googled Kim my Facebook account popped up. You can see a picture of my, a few of my "friends", and that I am a "fan" of Kappa Delta Pi. The final website is the results of the 2007 swimming championships for Oakland county.

I do not think that someone could learn that much about me from searching my name on the internet. I think they would assume that I am in the education program at Michigan State. They would know that at one point I was a swimmer at Stoney Creek High School in Rochester Hills, Michigan and I graduated from there in 2005. They would also know what I look like because there are pictures on the College of Ed website and, of course, Facebook.

I created a web portfolio so employers can learn about me through a site that I created. It will showcase work that I am proud of and will give some background information on me. One of my professional development goals for this semester is to really incorporate technology into my lesson plans. I plan on putting these lesson plans on my website and perhaps include a reflection on these lessons in my blog. I think that it is becoming much more important to use technology in the classroom, and I think employers would appreciate seeing how I plan on doing that in my portfolio. M portfolio is really simple to browse through, so employers can quickly find the information that they are looking for. Even though I plan on having an actual portfolio, I think that a web portfolio is a lot easier/quicker to look at.
 
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License.