Denominator

Been some discussion lately in class and during our readings at GaSt about using the correct vocabulary. All of my fellow students and our supervisors agree that the correct terms must be used when describing what we are doing. So, we shouldn't say "number on the top" and "number on the bottom" but rather we should say "numerator" and "denominator". My problem with that is, what is our definition that we give our students for those words. "Numberator" is known to students as "number on the top", and vice versa with the denominator, so are we really helping them speak "math" if they say it either way? I'm thinking about switching things up from "numerator" and "denominator" to "number we're dividing", and "number we're dividing by" and throw out the rest. Maybe it will work maybe not. We're gonna have to wait and see.

The why's

Gonna start taking over a freshmen honors Math 1 class. The students were complaining they weren't understanding the "why's" of what they were learning. Lets hope I'll start off on the right track.

Reading Directions...

Common mistakes being seen over here when grading tests. I remember being told as a student from both my teacher and my parents to make sure I "read the directions", and I guess there was a reason that they said so. Students are continuing to jump to work on a given problem without reading the simple statement above instructing them what to do. Moving on I will make sure that I write above any given problem that I am working through as examples the instructions of what we are doing. This way students will become more familiar with those instructions and what falter on tests.

Any concerns?

You may be asking... "Hey Mr. Messner, is there anything that you can point to that discourages you from using technology in the classroom?" I know I'd be asking such a thing. Well, there is one thing....

I dislike poorly put together websites and applications that I am forced to use. There are many school systems that have their own software that they force their teachers to use and the software is not necessarily the best out there. These applications sometimes prevent teachers from pursuing using their own website and personal technological systems because of potential unnecessary redundant work. Though it gets all educators to use a common system, it limits creativity and originality.

Doing a simple google search on school administration software you can see names like Capterra, ACS Technologies, Rediker, Activeeducate, Skyward, and many others. So if you potentially change school sytems, even if you stay in the same state, you may have to learn an entirely new program for everyday use.

So if you're an educator like me, be prepared for frustrating technological systems that you will be required to use. Also, if you're like me, hope for some big time consolidation from these guys...

First Post!

My first post on any blog. Pretty excited. I probably would have never created a blog if it had not been an assignment for this IT class that I am taking. A class I have been critical of to peers during the first few weeks of this semester. Lately however the class has forced me to create two google websites, located here and here, and now this blog. So my view of the class has changed, for the better of course.

Anyways, these first couple of posts are supposed to deal with my opinion on using technology in the classroom. Let me first show you what is needed for effective mathematics education, and we can go from there.
If you can squint your eyes and read the little orange boxes you can see in my philosophy "effective communication" lands under each of my three individuals areas. What is so great about technology is that it enables all to communicate in multiple ways. We have email, instant messaging, blogs, webpages, twitter, facebook, all as different ways to enable communication. Also, as a math educator I am able to access multiple online mathematics resources to expand my knowledge of subjects and have my students expand their knowledge. There are video postings on youtube that help explain certain subjects. Heck you can even post your own videos of lessons. Here's one of myself!



There are so many ways to help people communicate, expand general knowledge, and really just help both students and teachers during the entire process of math education using technology.

So I guess my opinion in short is, technology is a good thing to use inside and outside the classroom.... especially for math teachers.

Go blogging. Hope to be using this medium much more in the future.