Category: Math

Visual.ly- Infographics Galore!

Kelly Tenkely2 Comments on Visual.ly- Infographics Galore!2844 views

What it is:  I am a geek for infographics. I love the way they convey ideas so clearly (especially for visual learners like me!).  Visual.ly is infographic geek heaven.  At Visual.ly you can search all the best infographics from the web in one convenient place.  Do you (or  your students) have infographics to share? Upload your infographics to Visual.ly and share them with others.  Visual.ly even has a lab where you can create your own infographics!  Way cool!  Right now the create feature is limited to a Twitter infographic.

How to integrate Visual.ly into the classroom: Visual.ly is a great place to find infographics on any subject.  Search infographics by subject or keyword.  Use infographics to introduce new concepts, to begin a research project (is the infographic accurate?) or for review.  Infographics are brilliant in the way that they help communicate complex ideas in a clear, compact and visually appealing way.

Visual.ly can help students better understand infographics so they can create their own.  Right now Visual.ly only has the option for creating a Twitter related infographic (see mine below).  This is great if your class has a Twitter account, students can see what their connections online look like (of course just part of the story!).  You don’t have to wait on Visual.ly to finish their creation tool, use Excel, Numbers, Pages, PowerPoint, Keynote, etc. to create your own infographics!  Any time data is involved (science, math, geography, economics, history, government) students can create an infographic to visualize the learning.  It would be fun to create a class infographic bulletin board for the first weeks of school.  Collect data about students and use picture, shapes, etc. to create a customized infographic.   If you do this, come back and share pictures!!

Tips: Because infographics are user-created, some may not be appropriate for all classrooms.  If your students are going to spend time on Visual.ly, make sure you preview first!

**By the way, Visual.ly if you are listening, it would be AWESOME if you had an education version!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Visual.ly in  your classroom!

Brown Sharpie: Mathematical Cartoons Inspired by Sharpie Fumes

Kelly Tenkely2 Comments on Brown Sharpie: Mathematical Cartoons Inspired by Sharpie Fumes3768 views

What it is: Math geeks, eat your heart out…Brown Sharpie is for you!  I found Brown Sharpie by accident today as I was perusing the app store in iTunes.  Brown Sharpie is a collection of “mathematical cartoons inspired by sharpie fumes” drawn by Courtney Gibbons.  Gibbons is an aspiring mathematician and the cartoons were created as she completed her undergraduate and graduate degree.  Many of the cartoons reference higher math and may be too complex to use in the k-8 classroom.  There are a few here and there that could be used with younger students with a little explanation.  High school, college math students and math geeks are the main demographic for these cartoons. The cartoons are shared blog-style so you can search through them using the “next” and “previous” buttons or you can view by tags using the “view by…” word cloud in the right side bar.

             

How to integrate Brown Sharpie into the classroom: The Brown Sharpie cartoons would be a fun start to math class.  Put a cartoon up on a projector-connected computer each day for a little math humor to kick off class.  The cartoons will give you the opportunity to discuss current math topics as well as give an introduction to math concepts not yet touched on.

Why not hold your own Brown Sharpie day?  Give each student a brown fine-tipped sharpie to create their own math cartoons?  These can be shared on a class blog, website or wiki.  This will help your visual learners and artists think about math in a whole new way!  Students of any age can create a Brown Sharpie cartoon of their own!

In addition to the blog, Brown Sharpie is also a free app in the iTunes app store.

Tips: Some of the cartoons are PG-13 with alcohol or relationship references.  Best to preview the cartoon before displaying before your class. 🙂

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Brown Sharpie in  your classroom!

Automatoon: Create HTML5 animations

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on Automatoon: Create HTML5 animations15117 views


What it is: Oh. My. Word.  I’m slowly but surely making my way through my Google Reader and stumbled on a post by @rmbyrne on his EXCELLENT blog Free Tech 4 Teachers about Automatoon.  I immediately started playing with Automatoon and cannot say enough about how COOL it is!  Automatoon makes it simple for students (or teachers) to create animations within a web browser.  My very favorite part? It was built-in HTML5!! Do you know what that means? It works on iDevices (like the iPad and iPod touch).  A non-flash animations site! Pure genius.  This is one of the easiest animation programs I have seen.  Students can draw characters in pieces (kind of like a puppet or paper doll) and then create points where the pieces connect.  The drawings can animate by moving, bending or adding pieces to the picture.  SO cool!  After watching the demo video, I think even young students could have Automatoon mastered in no time.  The tools built into Automatoon are pretty robust for what a simple program it is to use.  Your students will look like animation masters, bringing their creations to life.  When students are finished creating their animations, they can download them as a zip file to be uploaded to any site.  There are two ways to login, students can login with a “throwaway” login that will not save their animation (but will let them create and download a quick animation) or login with a Google account.  This is fantastic for schools that take advantage of Google apps for education!

How to integrate Automatoon into the classroom: Kids of all ages love cartoons and animations, Automatoon gives them the tools to be the creator of those cartoon animations.  Students can create animations to animate processes in science (think the water cycle, plant life cycle, rock cycle, etc.), vocabulary words (in either native language or a second language), animate a piece of creative writing, animate a persuasive argument (think advertisement), animate a “book report”, animate solving a math problem, animate a story problem or animate an event in history.  The possibilities are really endless on this one, students will only be limited by their imaginations.

Automatoon is easy enough to use that with a little pre-planning, students could create animations in 5-10 minutes.  This is handy for those situations where you have one or two computers in the classroom or a limited time in a computer lab.  After learning how to use Automatoon, students can quickly create animations to illustrate learning.  Automatoon is a FANTASTIC little tool for your visual learners…they will “get” it.

Are your students having a hard time understanding a math or science concept or a vocabulary word?  Why not create an animation that illustrates the concept/word and share it on an interactive whiteboard or projector-connected computer?  The animation can be saved on the classroom website so that students can go back and access it throughout the year.

If you have a classroom website or wiki you could create a classroom animation collection.  Students can upload their creations to the class site for a great collection of learning.  It would be neat to animate sight words (Snapwords style), math or science vocabulary and create a visual “glossary” online that all of your students have contributed to.  Classes can add to it every year or you can work with other classes around the world to create a collaborative glossary.  This would also be a great tool to aid students in creating their own “e-textbooks” about any subject.  Students can create animations to embed in their other research, reflections and links.

Way cool.

Tips: Be sure to watch the intro video (above) to get a 5 minute low down on how to use Automatoon…very useful!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Automatoon in your classroom!

Boy’s Life Comic Creator

Kelly Tenkely4 Comments on Boy’s Life Comic Creator2829 views

What it is: Boy’s Life Magazine is a great place to reach those boys in your class that are reluctant readers or writers.  On the Boy’s Life site, you will find a Comic Creator where students can create a comic strip.  The Comic Creator is easy to use, offering enough tools for boys to really customize their comics but not SO many that they get lost in the forever search of pictures.  A great balance!

How to integrate Comic Creator into the classroom: The Boy’s Life Comic Creator is a great little tool to help your boys connect with writing and story telling in a way that they enjoy and understand.  The tool is simple enough to use as a writing station/center on classroom computers.  The comic does need to be created in one sitting, there is no way to save and come back to a comic later.  Completed comics can be printed off and shared.

The Comic Creator is a great entry point into writing but could also be useful in math for creating and solving story problems.  Students can create a short math comic strip that can be traded with other students to solve.

Students taking a foreign language class could practice new words by creating a comic strip story in Comic Creator.

Use Comic Creator the first week of school as a way for boys to tell all about themselves.  Each student can create a comic strip that stars them as the main character.  Invite other students to try to match the comic strip with the student as a fun interactive bulletin board activity (Think comics on one side, student pictures on the other and string to draw the “line” between matches).

Tips: I learned about the Boy’s Life Comic creator from The Book Chook, be sure to follow this GREAT kids lit blog!  The Boy’s Life website is packed full of goodies that your boys are sure to enjoy (there is even some reading that gets sneaked in there 🙂 ).

Please leave a comment and share how you are using Comic Creator in your classroom!

 

Off-Road Algebra: Using off road motorcycling videos to learn Algebra

Kelly Tenkely1 Comment on Off-Road Algebra: Using off road motorcycling videos to learn Algebra2731 views

What it is: Off Road Algebra is a series of video resources focused on pre-algebra and algebra for ninth grade.  This Hot Chalk  unit centers around off-road motorcycle racing.  There are 30 related problems for off-road algebra, each with an accompanying digital resources.

Problem 1: Conversion between gallons and liters

Problem 2: Miles per gallon

Problem 3: Gallons per mile

Problem 4: Velocity x time = distance, Part 1

Problem 5: Velocity x time = distance Part 2

Problem 6 (not available)

Problem 7: Comparing decibels

Problem 8: (not available)

Problem 9: Slopes and Ramps, Part 1

Problem 10: Slopes and Ramps, Part 2

Problem 11: Playing catch up, Part 1

Problem 12: Playing catch up, Part 2

Problem 13: GPS Axis

Problem 14: GPS conversion

Problem 15: GPS distance

Problem 16: Mixing Gas and Oil

Problem 17: Margin of Victory

Problem 18: Lap Time Math

Problem 19: Trac Turn Angles

Problem 20: Number of Revolutions

Problem 21: Inside and Outside a Wheel

Problem 22: Choosing between mean and median

Problem 23: Cylinder Volume

Problem 24: Comparing the Volume

Problem 25: Graphing the Ride

Problem 26: Acceleration, Part 1

Problem 27: Acceleration, Part 2

Problem 28: Acceleration, Part 3

Problem 29: Calculating with the contact patch

Problem 30: Tire Aspect Ratio

How to integrate Off-Road Algebra into the classroom: If you have spent any time in a math classroom, I’m sure you have heard something to the effect of, “why would we ever need this in real life?”.  It is a good question.  Learning should look like life…after all, isn’t that the point?  Off-Road Algebra helps students understand how the concepts they are learning in algebra are related to life through the world of off-road motorcycles.  Math is more than just filling in the correct answer on a test. Math is everywhere and we need to help students see that.

These videos walk students through off-road motorcycling problems so that they can make the connections between the classroom and life beyond the classroom.  There is a printable PDF that you can download that has thorough explanations and answers for all 30 problems. You can also find a correlation between the math problems and standards.

Use these videos with your whole class using a projector-connected computer or interactive whiteboard.  Video is ideal for math because it gives students the ability to pause, rewind and replay as needed.  Using an IWB with built-in IWB software, students can annotate over the desktop to solve equations as the video plays.

The videos are a great alternative to the standard math textbook, offering video explanations of how to solve a variety of problems.  Students can use these to support work in the classroom or at home.  The videos could make a quick-stop center activity in the one or two computer classroom.

Tips: Be sure to check out Hot Chalks other real-world math problems.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  Off Road Algebra  in your classroom!

 

Gudli: learning games for math, language, science, puzzles and fun

Kelly Tenkely4 Comments on Gudli: learning games for math, language, science, puzzles and fun5312 views

What it is: Gudli is a collection of games for kids that makes learning fun.  Students can play these interactive educational games while developing skills in math, logic, memory, words, creativity and more.  Gudli is free to use and a fantastic learning space for students in kindergarten, first and second grade.

Learning games include:

Math

  • Color Addition
  • Learn Shape
  • Color Subtraction
  • Number Series
  • Number Wheel
  • Add Numbers
  • Match Shape
  • Minus
  • How Many
  • Number Writing
  • Spider Counting
  • Color by Number
  • What Number Missing
  • Billing Counter
  • Time Zone
  • Table Memory
  • Mission Subtraction
  • Tick Tock Time
  • Quick Match
  • Math Story
  • Pattern Match
  • Counting Coins
  • Mission Addition

Language

  • Simple Sentences
  • Lead the Way
  • Rhyme Time
  • ABC Words
  • Word Rhyme
  • ABC Jigsaw
  • Word Trail
  • Sight Words
  • Labeling
  • Save Panda
  • Letter Blox
  • Word Hunt
  • The Blank
  • Opposite Adjectives
  • Spellathon
  • Scramble
  • Phonic Train
  • Googly Balloon
  • Alphabet Writing
  • What Letter Missing
  • Word Search
  • English Memory

Puzzle

  • Connect Pipe
  • US Map
  • Jigsaw Wonders
  • Stardoku
  • Shape and Shadow
  • Jigsaw Puzzle
  • Tetris Mania
  • Tricky Shuffler
  • Tic Tac Toe
  • Sliding Puzzle

Science

  • Butterfly Life Cycle
  • Grow Plant
  • Water Cycle
  • Animal Quiz
  • Jigsaw Safari

In the side bar student will learn fun “did you know” facts, Math tricks (like “Multiply by 9: Multiply by 10 and subtract the original number”) and grammar hints.  Each game is labeled with the grade level and has a short description of the game and learning goals.

How to integrate Gudli into the classroom: Gudli is a fun way for kids to practice learning in math, English and science.  These games make great center activities to support learning.  The games are short enough that they can be set up on classroom computers and students can take turns reinforcing learning and skill practice.  Gudli has enough games that students can play several in a lab setting where each student has a computer.  Students can choose the games that best meet their learning needs.

Gudli is a great site to share with parents looking for some ways to reinforce learning over the summer!

Tips: Gudli has a brand new virtual world coming soon!  Students will be able to explore a fun virtual world, “chat” with their friends, play in an interactive environment, challenge friends to games and of course learn!

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  Gudli in your classroom!

PSToM: Parents, Students, Teachers of Mathematics

Kelly TenkelyLeave a Comment on PSToM: Parents, Students, Teachers of Mathematics2465 views

What it is: PSToM is an online portal for math classes.  With PSToM parents can follow their child’s progress and know exactly what their child is learning in math.  Students can learn at their own pace, assess their own learning and know how well they are doing in math (and why!).  Teachers can recommend math videos, know each students strengths and weaknesses and tailor classroom instruction to get more out of each class.  PSToM has built-in math problems with an area to solve them, math videos that can be shared, built-in tests and a place to discuss learning.  The site is simple but the learning possibilities are pretty incredible.

How to integrate PSToM into the classroom: PSToM is a fantastic supplement to the math classrooms.  PSToM makes it simple to create a blended classroom with online content, discussion and problem solving supporting what is happening in the classroom.  As a teacher it is easy to assign math videos and problem sets.  All data is collected and shared with students, parents and teachers.  PSToM is a great connection between the math classroom and home.  The mystery of the math classroom is taken out for both the parents and students.  Everyone knows what learning goals are being worked on, the progress and what skills need to be practiced.

Use PSToM as a supplement to your math classroom and to customize math lessons for your students.  Give students the opportunity to work on math at their unique learning level in a computer lab setting or as a center on classroom computers.

Tips: Be sure to tell parents about PSToM, it is a great way for students to get some extra practice and opportunity for understanding in at home.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  PSToM  in your classroom!

Isle of Tune: Create a musical journey

Kelly Tenkely3 Comments on Isle of Tune: Create a musical journey8332 views

What it is: Isle of Tune is a site that has just significantly impacted my productivity today- I can’t stop playing!  Thanks to @Matt_Arguello and @dancallahan for this share today on Twitter!  Isle of Tune lets students create musical journeys out of street layouts.  Roadside elements act as instruments and cars are the players.  Students can create whole islands of music by creating a street layout, adding objects that generate different sounds and adding cars to play the music.  Each object has an object panel where students can adjust the sound, volume or clone the object.  Students can determine when a sound will be played based on the ground lighting up when the car passes.  Junctions change the course of passing cars or can “loop” a sound.  It is easy for students to get started, they just click “Create a new island” and away they go.  Students can name their island anything and save to return to it later.  No need for registration, the Internet browser they are using just needs to have cookies enabled (this is a bit of a problem for shared classroom computers with a single account).

How to integrate Isle of Tune into the classroom: Isle of Tune is an enchanting place for creation.  The sky is the limit as students create music based on visual creation.  Aside from teaching some great music principles, Isle of Tune would be a fantastic way to teach students pattern.  Students can use Isle of Tune to construct patterns of objects and actually experience the connection between math and music as they “play” their pattern tune.

Isle of Tune would also be a fun place for students to learn about maps and ordinal directions and basic graphing.  Students can start with oral directions about where to lay their street “Four street squares North East, two street squares West”.  After directions are given, students can customize their islands with trees, houses, lamp posts, etc.  You can quickly tour the room for some formative assessment while students complete their island.  Let students take turns listening to each other’s Isle of Tune, noting similarities and differences based on the patterns made.

Use Isle of Tune as a creative writing prompt.  Students can create an island and tune and write an imaginative story about the island they created.  The saved island makes a nice visual-aid and soundtrack for their finished story.

Isle of Tune makes a great interactive whiteboard, or projector-connected computer activity.  Students can work together to create a giant island of tunes.  Use the annotate over the desktop feature to label directions, coordinates and patterns.

The shared songs are pretty incredible- many of the “top” shares are popular music that has been created using Isle of Tune.

Tips: Isle of Tune is currently available on the web, keep an eye out for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad versions coming soon!  If Isle of Tunes inspires your students to want to become architects or engineers, point them toward online CAD Drafting classes.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  Isle of Tune in your classroom!

Cyberkidz: games for math, literacy, geography, creativity and science

Kelly Tenkely3 Comments on Cyberkidz: games for math, literacy, geography, creativity and science3893 views

What it is: Cyberkidz is a great new website packed full of great learning practice games for kids age 4 to 11.  The games reinforce skills in a variety of disciplines including math, literacy, geography, creativity and science.

Math– amounts, pattern, scale, number recognition, counting, scale, sums to 10, sums to 20, weights, multiplication, telling time, money, measurement, calendar, volume, percentage, distance, division, mathmix, area

Literacy– letter recognition, alphabetical order, hangman, crosswords, typing, singular and plural words, sayings and quotes, learning Spanish, learning Dutch

Geography– America, state capitals, countries of the world, Asia, Africa, France, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, South Africa, Ireland, flags

Creative– painting, music, coloring, maze

Science– food for animals, skeletal system, body parts, animals, solar system, mammals, the eye

The games in each category are great for practice and skill building.

How to integrate Cyberkidz into the classroom: Cyberkidz is a fun place for students to work on the knowledge level of Bloom’s Taxonomy.  The music game is the only creative game that I would truly place in the “create” category of Bloom’s Taxonomy because it gives students free rein to explore music and create a recording.   The majority of the games are designed to help students build skills and remember key concepts that are a necessary foundation for other learning.  These are a nice alternative to worksheet skill practice.  Students will enjoy the game quality of these practice activities.  Each activity can be advanced through relatively quickly making them perfect as a center on classroom computers.  Students can visit the game as a math, literacy, geography or science “practice” center before advancing to put those newly honed skills to work in a higher order thinking center.

These practice activities could also be completed as a class using an interactive whiteboard or projector connected computer.  Split students into teams and rotate them up to the whiteboard for a class practice session.

Tips: On each game screen, students can scroll to the bottom for instructions on the game.  Most of the games are pretty self-explanatory and kids will figure them out quickly.

Please leave a comment and share how you are using  Cyberkidz in your classroom!

Using Angry Birds to teach math, history and science

Kelly Tenkely55 Comments on Using Angry Birds to teach math, history and science11350 views

This post has been generously sponsored by iTutorMaths – GCSE Maths Tutors in the UK

Yesterday instead of dutifully writing a blog post, I was having fun building catapults with kids.  I was playing with a transdisciplinary lesson using Angry Birds as my inspiration.  Yes, you read correctly-Angry Birds.

It doesn’t seem to matter what age group or demographic that I talk to, kids (and adults) everywhere are fans of Angry Birds. As I was playing around with Angry Birds (yep I’m a fan too), I started thinking about all of the learning that could be happening.  I have watched a two year old tell an older sister that “you have to pull down to go up higher”.  I have watched as kids master this game through trial and error.  Being the teacher that I am, I started dreaming up a transdisciplinary lesson with Angry Birds as the base.

I happened to be writing an inquiry lesson that has students look at inventions throughout time and thought: the catapult-that is an invention that has technology and concepts that are used even today.  This is one of those inspirational moments that comes when you are drifting off to sleep and has you frantically searching for paper and pen to record as fast as the ideas come.  So what did I do? I got myself out of bed and went to work sketching out a super awesome plan.

Here is the embedded learning that I came up with:

  • Primary Math: positional math language (above, below, left, right, bottom, biggest, smallest), measurement (distance), angles, shapes
  • Intermediate Math: parabolas, velocity, angels, trajectory, acceleration, quadratic formulas
  • Science: simple machines (lever), mechanics, force, energy, velocity/speed
  • History: history of the catapult, changes made to catapult technology throughout history, modern-day inventions that use this technology
  • Music: Tie in with history, what music was popular in the middle ages when catapults were invented (give students a feel for the culture of the time).
  • Art: Tie in with history, what era of art was happening during the middle ages when catapults were invented (give students a feel for the culture of the time).
  • Language Arts: reflection writing, reading text for information (non-fiction books and websites)
  • Learning: application of Angry Birds on students as learners, application of building a catapult on students as learners (I can’t claim this one it was all @stumpteacher with this blog post).

I set up 3 stations of learning and exploration.   In the first station students found Angry Birds on the iPads (now also available on the Internet in Chrome here), guiding questions, sticky notes and books on the history of catapults and simple machines.  Guiding questions were on chart paper and invited kids to join in the question asking by jotting down their own “wonders” on sticky notes and adding them to the chart questions.  At this station students “tested” Angry Birds and were asked to consider energy, force, acceleration, speed, angle and distance as they played.  Kids had fun with this, I anticipated that they would stick strictly to the  iPad and Angry birds but all of the kids looked through the books at some point.  There was a lot of talk about strategy, what they noticed about angle and how far to pull back on the different levels to get the bird to reach the target.

At Station 2 students found random materials that they could use to build their own catapult.  We included small blocks of wood, duct tape, string, rubber bands, paper clips, plastic cups, smaller dixie cups, paint stir sticks, popsicle sticks, plastic silverware,  markers, empty toilet paper rolls, clothes pins and of course the marshmallow to launch.  Students colored their marshmallow with sharpies to look like an Angry Bird (if doing this with kindergarten, be sure to mention that as soon as the marshmallow is colored, it is no longer food…we had a couple who were begging to eat the colored mallow!).  Next, students went to work constructing their catapults.  We offered no instructions and just let them go to town.  There was a lot of trial and error but all of the kids (kindergarten through eighth grade) made working catapults.  Students tested their catapult and experimented with speed, distance, accuracy, fulcrum, angle and force.  After launching the marshmallow bird they measured for distance and recorded.

As students tested we asked them:

  • What makes the catapult more accurate?
  • What makes the bird go the furthest?
  • Does mass affect the results?
  • How do objects move?
  • How do we calculate motion?
  • What is acceleration?
  • What is speed?
  • What are some forces that act on objects in motion?
  • How did the catapult set the marshmallow in motion?
  • Which challenge did your catapult meet best, accuracy or distance?
  • What helped the catapult?
  • What kind of energy did your catapult use?
  • What kind of force?
  • What are other kinds of levers?
  • What are simple machines?
  • What happens when the arm of a lever is shortened or the load is moved?
  • What happens to the force needed to make the load move?
  • What happens when you move the fulcrum?
  • What is the relationship between force and distance?
  • What happens when you adjust the angle?

Students had a fantastic time learning through trial and error and working together to reach our pig targets.  The collaboration among students was neat to watch, students would give each other ideas for fine-tuning the catapults to improve results.

In the third station, students had the opportunity to reflect on what they learned.  We asked them to reflect literally and figuratively.  Literally what did you learn about how a simple machine works, parabolas, measurement, etc.  What did you learn about catapults and how the technology is used today?  Then we asked them to think about the activity figuratively, what can Angry Birds teach them about life? What can it teach them about the learning process?

 

Older students looked at the math and science behind Angry Birds, using screen shots to determine if a bird would make it to the pigs based on parabolas.

Younger students labeled their catapult diagram with the language they learned about simple machines, force, and motion.  Students also labeled the Angry Birds diagram.

To wrap up we discussed the middle ages as a class and went through some of the texts together.  We read the history of the catapult and talked about why it was a necessary invention.  We connected all of this with how the technology is currently being used on air craft carriers (the boys really got into that discussion).

Who knew you could learn so much from a game of Angry Birds?

Here are some of the resources that we used during this lesson:

Projectile Motion simulation

Angry Birds Pig Target

Catapult guide for students

Myth Busters YouTube clip of tree catapult

The Physics of Angry Birds

Angry Birds Geogebra