Here is an archive all of my posts by year and month:
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Below is a list of blog posts that are either some of my favourite blog posts I have written or have been popular reads on this blog.
For Whom are Interactive Whiteboards Interactive?
I get asked a fair bit, are interactive white boards (IWB) a worthwhile investment for schools? The answer I have to say, is no. To follow my reasoning, first ask the question for whom are they interactive?
They seem like they are interactive for teachers. They give the teacher the opportunity to interact with material and to demonstrate materials for students in a more engaging way than the traditional white board. This is provided that the teacher has the time to develop the materials in advance for the students, or the time to find said resources that have been shared by other teachers. It is also provided that the teachers have been given some training on how to use the IWB as very few teachers will experiment and figure out the full potential use on their own. (read more)
Forget the future: Here’s the textbook I want now
The old paper form of a textbook is certain to die. I’m sure of it.
The new form of a “textbook” has a feature list that turns the textbook from something people read to something people experience. Note that this feature list isn’t fantasy, nearly all of these features already exist in some form…. (read more)
The difference between instrumental and relational understanding
I recently found this article written by Richard Skemp that Gary Davis (@republicofmath) highlighted on his blog . I recommend reading the whole article. Skemp describes the difference between instrumental and relational understanding, and how the word understanding is used by different people to mean different types of understanding. He also makes the observation that what we call mathematics is in fact taught in two very distinct ways. Skemp uses an analogy to try and explain the difference between relational and instrumental knowledge which I would like to explore. (read more)
It could be because the mathematical procedures that are taught in schools will be useful to students later, but I am pretty sure this is false. Almost everyone forgets those procedures as they get older because most people in our society use virtually none of the procedures they learned in school in their day-to-day life. Obviously there are engineers, mathematicians, and scientists who use the mathematics they have learned, possibly on a daily basis, but I think if you dig deeper into the work they do, many of these people use tools to help to do their work (like Mathematica, for example), look up the finer details of mathematical procedures that they do not use often, or who use only a very specialized portion of their mathematical knowledge regularly. (read more)
Ways to Use Technology in Math Class
Here are some ways you can use technology in your math class which are more interesting and innovative than using an interactive white board or having students watch instructional videos. Note that these ideas are all examples of potential student uses of technology.
Students could:
Record video tutorials: Instead of students digesting tutorials created by someone else, have them create their own tutorials. (read more)
