Teaching Math with Technology

Taking math education into the 21st century, and bringing my students and visionary teachers along for the ride!

Category : Software

New Tech to Try!

November 1st 2012 Posted at Algebra, education, eInstruction Interwrite Workspace, Evernote, handwriting math, Helping students, Insight360, insight360 clickers, iPad, iPad applications, Livescribe, Livescribe, livescribe smartpen, Mathcast, Mobi, Student participation, taking notes, Teaching, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks), Technology
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I apologize for not writing more posts this semester, but I have been swamped with work and play :)

I just received the new wi-fi Livescribe smartpen called SKY today and I promise to write a blog post soon about the features and how I plan on using it.  Wi-fi opens the potential of the smartpen to be even smarter!! I can’t wait!

I have been using Doceri 2.0 along with the Mobi 360 w/ clickers in my math classes and plan on updating all of you on how well that is going (it is going REALLY well, by the way)  and how I have used them with my students.

Stay tuned….

 

My Student Hyperstudio Projects

December 18th 2011 Posted at education, HyperStudio, Interactive Projects, Math Projects, Mathcast, Software, Teaching, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks)
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Student Hyperstudio5 Projects

The final project I had my Math For Elementary Teachers do for the course was to create an interactive Hyperstudio Project.


The projects are too large to be viewed well inside my blog, so I have created a website to house them. The website is best viewed using Safari if possible, if not, just ignore the browser warning, as I have used a beta version of Hyperstudio to export them into HTML5 .

I have many of my student’s projects posted on a THIS WEBSITE.    Enjoy!

 

GlogsterEDU Projects for Students

October 15th 2011 Posted at education, Glogster, GlogsterEDU, Google Sites, Interactive Projects, Livescribe, Livescribe, Math Projects, online tools, Teaching, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks)
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CREATIVE ONLINE PROJECTS

Next week my students in my Math For Elementary Teachers class will be creating a Glog:  an interactive, online poster.   GlogsterEDU will allow them to create their Glog for free and publish it to their Google Website for the class.

I just finished creating a new Glog to show a few uses of the Livescribe smartpen in the classroom.  I plan on using this as an example when I teach them how to use GlogsterEDU.

Link to the Glog if you cannot see it above.

I will post some of their work when completed!

 

Getting Organized

August 13th 2011 Posted at Algebra, Camtasia, education, eInstruction Interwrite Workspace, Flash, Flash, Helping students, Interactive Projects, Livescribe, Livescribe, Lumens DC265 Ladibug document camera, Math Projects, Mathcast, Mobi, MyScript, Teaching, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks), Technology, Training, videos
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ADDING MY VIDEOS TO THIS BLOG

I have heard from several people that they would like to see some of the educational videos I have created.  I realize there was a pull down menu at the top of my blog for it, but I never actually organized the content I have created in the past.

In the past 6 months I have had to wipe both my Mac and my Windows machine (long stories), so some of my videos are now “lost’, but luckily YouTube still has a small collection.

I finally got organized today and separated my videos into categories.  If you look along the top of my blog, you will see a category called “Animations/Videos” :



Most of my videos fall in to four categories of  ”How-To” videos, “Educational Teaching Videos”, “Flash Animated Tutorials”, and “Livescribe pencasts”.  I will be adding some Animationish videos after this Fall when I have my students creating some.

I created the “How-To” videos to teach others how to use software or hardware.  Here are the categories I have in that section:

I plan on adding more videos to this section in the near future, so some of the categories do not have any links yet.

The next main category I have been creating videos for is in “Educational Teaching Videos”.  These are short videos I have created for my students to introduce a topic we are studying in the class.

As you can see when you look through the Educational Teaching videos, I was trying out several types of hardware/software to see what worked best.   I used the eInstruction Workspace software for a “whiteboard” in some videos, and recorded and edited with Camtasia studio.  In other videos I used a Lumens HD Ladibug document camera.  I found the document camera to be better for me when I am actually needing to record working with actual objects like base ten blocks and fraction circles.   I will hopefully be making more videos using these this semester. I will try to keep up with posting them here so I don’t lose them again!!

Most of the tutorials/lessons I have created for my students in the past year are Livescribe pencasts, but I find when I need the lesson to be more visual, a video is better.    My livescribe pencasts are organized by topic on THIS PAGE.  I have quite a few pencasts collected there.   When I had to wipe my computers, I lost all the original pencasts, so for now I cannot change any of those pencasts into PDF’s to download.

Lastly, about six years ago I started created Flash animated tutorials to help my students in my Math For Elementary Teachers classes better visualize the math they will be teaching. I strongly believe visualization is key to understanding!

The Flash animated tutorials are housed on a separate area (outside of my blog).   They are organized by arithmetic topic:

For example, clicking on the “1/3″ would take you to the fraction tutorials, and the “2″ will take you to the multidigit whole number operations.  This type of tutorial takes me a lot longer to create, so I do not have many in some areas (like decimals).   Instead, I am starting to create more interactive tutorials using Hyperstudio.  To see a few of those interactive tutorials, CLICK HERE.

These are still a work in progress, but I promise to continue adding here so check back!

 

 

New Livescribe Connectors For OneNote and Google Sites!

August 3rd 2011 Posted at Connect, education, Evernote, Facebook, Google, Google Docs, Google Docs, Google Sites, Livescribe, Livescribe, Livescribe Pencast Player, Mathcast, OneNote, Teaching, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks), Technology
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*Image taken from the Livescribe Facebook Page.

I downloaded the latest version of Livescribe desktop to try out the NEW connectors.   Livescribe just added Microsoft OneNote and Google Sites to their list of connectors!   Download the lastest desktop at:  http://www.livescribe.com/en-us/starthere 

connect
brought to you by Livescribe

Here is a screenshot of a Google website I created.  You can use the launch-line feature and write the words “Google Site” (the pen recognizes the words you want pretty quickly – or you can make a short cut like “sites” for it)

 

Every time you sync a new pencast to Google Sites, it creates a new webpage on your site and embeds the playable pencast on the page.  You can rename and edit the page any way you would like after the pencast is uploaded.    What a great way to share a test key or answer student questions so all students have access to it!

The other new Connector is for Microsoft OneNote.   I have read a lot of feedback from folks REALLY wanting this connector.   Since I use Evernote (a LOT), I haven’t really played with OneNote, but this gave me the perfect excuse to crack it open and start playing!

After syncing your pen using the OneNote Connector, when you open up Microsoft OneNote you see two things:

1)  A rough screen shot of your pencast, and

2)   An embedded Pencast PDF file that holds the entire pencast (includes both synced audio and animation)

If you double click on the PDF file in the upper right, it opens Adobe (10 or higher) and shows you the actual animated pencast.   This pencast is still in your OneNote notebook, but can also be shared with others.

The PDF pencast comes with a player that allows you to play, stop and scrub through the pencasts as you want.

You do not have to use launch-lines to use the connectors – they also show up in a menu on the left side of your Livescribe desktop:

 

All you need to do is sync your pen and then drag any “page” from your notebook onto one of the connectors – and you are done!

I already use the other connectors all the time, now I have even more choices to make my life easier.

I am looking forward to being able to create a Google Website that houses all the pencasts I upload for my students, so I can just post the link to the website for my students, rather than having to embed each new pencast I make manually.    This update for Connect is extremely helpful for me and will save me a LOT of time this semester!!

Loving all the new updates from Livescribe as they listen in on what their users really need “now”.  I can’t wait to see what is next!

 

 

Mapping my Syllabus (again)

July 31st 2011 Posted at education, iPad applications, Math Projects, mindmapping, Mindmeister, MindMeister, Software, Teaching, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks), Technology
1 Comment

I am rewriting a blog post from a year ago…

Last year I used a mindmap of my course syllabus to show them an example of mapping out something.  They will be mapping out at least one unit and bringing in new resources to share with the rest of the class this semester, so I decided to update my MindMeister mindmap to go with the new syllabus

Here is a link to the actual mindmap if you cannot see it above.

I will also be creating several other project samples for the students using the course syllabus – stay tuned!

 

Did I mention that MindMeister has an iPad app?!!

 

Summer Projects for Visual and Interactive Math

May 20th 2011 Posted at Algebra, Camtasia, education, GeoGebra, GeoGebra, HyperStudio, Interactive Projects, Livescribe, Livescribe, Math Projects, Mathematica, Photoshop, Teaching, TechFriends(Geeks), WolframAlpha
2 Comments

Visual Interactive Learning
I have been sitting here staring at my computer for the past week since I got back from an amazing time with a room full of extremely innovative teachers in San Francisco as part of the Livescribe Educational Advisory Board.

I keep staring at it not being able to decide where to start!  I have so many new ideas that I want to implement for the Fall, and now I have even more resourceful people to guide me when I get stuck!

Some of the big ones on my list I have already started working with, but I want to dig deeper and create projects for my students to interact with, and also projects for them to create:

Hyperstudio5 (Roger Wagner will be at ISTE this summer, so that will be fun!)
GeoGebra
Camtasia
Livescribe (new cool stuff coming next week!!)

The newest application I want to learn:

I have been playing with WolframAlpha for the past year, but I recently purchased Mathematica and I am excited to see what I can create with it! My goal is to create visual and interactive materials for Algebra and Geometry.    I will post as soon as I start building!  I am still watching the video tutorials for now.   I want to look further into the following links as well:

Wolfram Research STEM Initiative

Wolfram Faculty Program

Lastly, I NEED to learn Photoshop.   My oldest son currently creates all of my artwork for my projects, but in a few years he will be off to college and won’t be around to help me!

Hopefully between spending time with my family and attending ISTE and HI-TEC this summer, I will be able to dig deeper and create some projects for next Fall using some of these great interactive applications!

 

Writing Math in Windows 7!

April 21st 2011 Posted at Algebra, Assistive Technology, education, handwriting math, Helping students, Math Input Panel, Math Projects, Teaching, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks), Technology, Windows7
2 Comments

I was so excited to see a new window show up when I upgraded to Windows 7…it is called the Math Input Panel.  With a name like that I had to be excited before even trying it out!

 

I immediately started playing with it and was surprised and VERY happy to see how easy it was to handwrite math and have it insert the typed version into my Word document!  It does not always pick the correct letter or number, but you can easily edit an individual symbol.

 

I have tried writing some algebra, and it does a great job with that as well!


 

I am excited to see more tools for my students to be able to use to ‘write” math on their computers as well.   Although Word comes with Equation Editor, my students do not know how to use it.    Now, students can easily handwrite their math problems and have them typed up!

For students with disabilities – or anyone who wants to have the math read out loud to them, Word can then take the file that has the math equations embedded  and be saved as a MathXL document.   MathPlayer should then be able to read the math out loud….I will try that next and see how it works out!

 

Creating INTERACTIVE activities with HyperStudio5!

April 13th 2011 Posted at Algebra, education, HyperStudio, Interactive Projects, Math Projects, Mathcast, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks)
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Link to the official Hyperstudio website

In my spare time (ha ha) I have been playing with Roger Wagner’s Hyperstudio 5.   (Luckily Roger Wagner himself has been helping me!!)  What a fun program!    My goal is to create more INTERACTIVE activities and tutorials/videos for my students, without all the work of Flash.   Hyperstudio fits that goal amazingly well!   It is similar to PowerPoint, but far more incredible in my book!

I “finished” my first final draft (I keep “fixing it” so it is forever in draft mode) of an interactive tutorial on introducing combinations and counting, and posted the project on a new area of my website with the button “HyperStudio Projects”.

Before clicking on the link below that will take you to the Hyperstudio stack, you must first make sure you are using either Safari or Internet Explorer, because these are the only browsers that have the Hyperstudio web-brower add-on for now.   To get the browser add-on, go to:  http://www.mackiev.com/support_hs.html , click on the proper computer type, then get the browser add-in for either Safari or Internet Explorer, then you will be able to view and PLAY WITH the activity.

Here is the direct link to my first project: http://www.tech4mathed.com/HyperStudio/IceCream_SG.html

If you have the browser add-on correctly installed you should see the following screen:

Once the stack is finished loading, the screen should look like:

Now you are ready to click on “go to STORY”.

I created the story like a video, and I narrated every screen, so you can  hear the narration if you click on the button. The audio level needs some work, some of the narration is too quiet and I will need to redo those sections.  The most fun part of it, however, is the INTERACTIVITY that was easy to create!

In this activity, I created an Ice Cream Playground, where you can actually move around all the objects on the page to explore and find the answer before viewing the explanation of the solution.  My 14 year old son did all of the artwork for me!   It is wonderful having a live-in artist on hand!

Please give it a try and let me know what I can do to make it more interesting for my students.   I also need to know if you are able to view it on a Mac and on a Windows machine.  Some Windows machines can view it and some cannot, so I am trying to trouble-shoot which versions of Windows have difficulty to help find a fix for that.

I am excited to make more projects and play with Hyperstudio!

 

 

Training My Dragon!

April 9th 2011 Posted at Algebra, Assistive Technology, Dragon NaturallySpeaking, education, Livescribe, Mathcast, MathType, MyScript, Teaching Online, TechFriends(Geeks)
5 Comments

Dragon Naturally Speaking Web Link

 

I have started on a quest to make math more accessible!   I recently purchased Dragon NaturallySpeaking, Premium ver 11.0.   It just came today and I have been playing with it to train it to trancribe my voice.     So far it has  done a great job in Word, but then I decided to have it transcribe the audio file from the Livescribe pencast below.

Link to pencast

 

When the pencast is still on your desktop, you can export the audio separately.  I then imported the audio file directly into Dragon and the original transcipt is shown below (I just cropped a small part of the transcript for you to see).  I still have a lot of “training” on Dragon to do, but it didn’t do a bad job for the first try!  It certainly has potential to help create a transcript for my pencasts for students who need one.


(click on the image to see a larger version of the text)

Livescribe also has transcription software you can purchase called “MyScript”.  Here is a link to the software.   It has some difficulty transcribing the math, but here is the first pass it made:

(click on the image to see a larger version of the text)

My next task it to to learn to use MathType,

together with Dragon, to create equations that can be read aloud for students.   I will post when I make some progress there.  :)

 
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