The Next Time You Get That iTunes Giftcard...

think about purchasing a Math App from the Education App Store (http://www.apple.com/education/apps/). Unfortunately, I don't own any Apple products, so I am unable to actually try out and test some of these apps, but it really intrigued me that there was a market out there for math-based apps. Not only can you turn your iPod or iPad into a basic calculator, but through these apps, it can be transformed into a graphing calculator, an interactive manipulative to aid in learning algebra or even a "chalk board" that can be used to learn and practice arithmetic.

I can definitely see there being a large potential for these kinds of apps to play a role in the classroom. Students are glued to these kinds of technologies, and if educators can tap into this successfully, students can take materials used in the classroom home for additional practice outside of the traditional textbook homework assignments.

If anyone has any experience using any of these math apps from the iTunes store, I would really like to hear about it.

Things You May Not Know About Your Calculator.....

Did you know your graphing calculator can draw the derivative, integral, or inverse of a function? How about that it has the ability to perform linear, exponential, logarithmic or power regressions?  Or how it can be used to effectively evaluate sequences and series?

If we are going to effectively use the calculator as a technology in our classrooms to its fullest extent, we need to be intimately familiar with how it can potentially be used. As our Interactivity from this week emphasized, when we use technology in our lessons, it shouldn't be thrown in there just to use it. Instead, we need to incorporate it in truly planned, useful ways that hit home the learning goals and standards. By increasing our own personal knowledge of how the calculator can be used, we open up a whole host of possibilities of establishing lessons where the calculator is use to its fullest and most meaningful extent.

There are a lot of resources available to help in this, but one I found to be particularly helpful is located at http://mathbits.com/mathbits/tisection/openpage.htm. The website contains information about using the graphing calculator (there are sections for the TI-83, TI-84 and TI-NSpire) in many different areas of mathematics. There are also some helpful "Quick Reference" sheets that may be useful to either refresh your memory or distribute to students.

Interactivity #4

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0ArsgjpLWpPDrdGowcmE4dmFyOXZEeVd0cHBKTVB4WVE 

Whenever I think of technology and Mathematics, I automatically think of scatter plots, graphs, linear regressions and best fit lines. This lesson plan is a great demonstration of many of those concepts, and it presents them using something that most everyone is familiar with: EBay. I also think that by using the PS3 as a “new” technology in the worksheet and questions, it causes students to actually think about factors that affect the prices of new technologies. I did not notice any real gaps between the goals, strategies and technologies in this lesson. When I was reading it though, I immediately thought of trying to incorporate Excel as much as possible as opposed to hand-graphing. In the context of scatter plots and lines of best fit, Excel is definitely the “go-to” technology, and I think incorporating it would only enhance the lesson and strengthen the learning goals. A program like Excel is truly an “all-in-one” package for the learning goals in this lesson: it can find a linear equation to model a set of data and provide a clear, well-organized representation to aid in analysis and interpretation.

Thinking About Standards...

Standard 8.1 Educational Technology:  All students will use digital tools to access, evaluate, and synthesize information in order to solve problems individually and collaboratively and to create and communicate knowledge.

Standard 9.1 21st-Century Life and Career Skills: All students will demonstrate the creative, critical thinking, collaboration, and problem-solving skills needed to function successfully as both global citizens and workers in diverse ethnic and organizational cultures.

•  Critical Thinking and Problem Solving 
• Creativity and Innovation 
• Collaboration, Teamwork, and Leadership  
• Cross-Cultural Understanding and Interpersonal Communication 
• Communication and Media Fluency 

What does it mean to "prepare" students for the 21st century exactly? I think the State of New Jersey hit the nail on the head with the "5 C's" outlined above in cross-curricular standard 9.1. No matter what subject area you teach, or where you teach for that matter, education is so much more than just learning math, science or literature. Education is learning how to think critically about things, how to innovate, how to work on a team, how to communicate to other people and how to become fluent in the many forms of media available.

This is where we educators can bring in Standard 8.1 regarding Educational Technology. If we can effectively bring technology into our classroom in a way that not only teaches our subject, but causes them to think critically about technology, we are "teaching" them 21st Century Skills. While the use of technology is definitely a great skill to have in the 21st Century, what good is it if we cannot analyze, innovate and question forms of technology?