Teaching Math with Technology

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

Posts Tagged ‘Clickers’

New “Insight” into Teaching with Technology!

April 9th 2012 Posted at CPS Clickers, education, Future Tech, Insight360, insight360 clickers, iPad, iPad applications, Mobi, Teaching, TechFriends(Geeks), Technology
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Introduction to the Insight 360 system by eInstruction

I have been using eInstruction’s Mobi, MobiView and CPS Pulse clickers, along with their Workspace software now for several years.   At times, having to open different programs to run the clickers with the Mobi was a bit challenging, and sometimes I found it difficult to set up questions ahead of time.   All that has changed with the Insight360 system.

As you can see in the photo, the hardware that has replaced the Mobi and Mobi View looks exactly like the Mobi View (still with the touch screen- yay!), but with new software and menus.   The new software also run the Insight360 clickers and makes it seemless to use them in your classroom!  HUGE improvement!

The old Mobi and Mobi View can still be used with the system as student Mobis, which is great.   The new Insight 360 system makes it very simple to split the screen and allow students with a Mobi (or Mobi View) to write on the virtual whiteboard from their seat, so you don’t have to worry about not being able to use the old hardware!   You can even update your old CPS pulse clickers to the new system easily, rather than having to purchase new clickers!   *I prefer these clickers over other systems I have seen because they work extremely well WITH the Mobi (they are not just stand alone clickers).   From anywhere in the room, I can access live data coming from the clickers (my students) to make immediate decisions about how to change the course of my classroom instruction, and the system works with any software on your computer – like Powerpoint, anything on the internet, or even the Workspace software from the Mobi generation.  So teaching with this system does NOT tie you down to only one application to teach from on your classroom computer.

The best feature (OK, one of the best) is that now you can run the Insight 360 application from an iPad 2!   This frees up all existing Mobis or Mobi Views in your classroom to become student Mobis!   As you can see in the image below, they even went as far as to make a case to house the iPad to give it the look and feel of a Mobi!

 

I just started this week to use my new Insight360 system, so more information and photos to follow, along with opinions from my students on how they like learning from this new system.

The new  Insight360 is a finalist in the 2012 EdTech Digest Awards Program for the Cool Tool Ward!   EdTech Digest Awards 2012

To learn more about the new Insight360 system from eInstruction, you can visit their website.

 

Presenting….my syllabus!

August 1st 2010 Posted at CPS Clickers, Livescribe, Lumens DC265 Ladibug document camera, Math Projects, Mathcast, Mobi, Prezi
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I have been spending the past few weeks trying to think of better ways to get my future teachers to be more engaged in their learning. I have decided to model several ideas after a great friend of mine who writes the amazing Teaching College Math blog, Maria Andersen.

Not only am I going to use hands on manipulatives and technology (like I have been) to teach with, but to help my students organize their thoughts and the material for the course, I am going to have them create a Prezi, a Wiki, a Blog and a Mindmap. One fourth of the class will be doing each of these for every test. Each student will rotate through the 4 types of online tools for every test (but not in the same order as the rest of their group). All students will also create a google website to house links to all of their creations and any notes or other information they want to add, along with their service learning journal. The website will be private and they will only share viewing privileges with me. The other 4 online components will be public and shared with the rest of the class.

I am hoping that not only will they have a better feel for the material in each quarter of the course, but it will be theirs to keep online and reuse the ideas and links when they become teachers. It will be helpful for them to study for each test because all 4 types of models will be created by the class for each test, and they will be able to use one another’s to help them study.

I decided I would model some of the types for the students, by creating my syllabus as a Prezi, and also in a mindmap format. (I will write a new blog entry when I finish my mindmapped syllabus).

I thought it would not be as helpful to show them the syllabus in Blog format (they can see this blog for ideas), and my syllabus is already on a website (just not a free google one). I am still contemplating whether to show an example of my syllabus as a wiki.

Here is the first pass at my syllabus as a Prezi:

Math156syllabus on Prezi *the Prezi is now having issues viewing…try THIS LINK

Copy of Math156syllabus on Prezi

I think I have narrowed it down to have them use the following free online tools:

Prezi (for a free online presentation style of tool)
MindMeister (for a free online mindmapping tool)
Glogster (for a free online fun poster tool))
Wordpress or Blogger (for a free online blog)

Google website for their free online website

I hope they are as excited as I am to learn these great tools and put them into “action”!


Clip to Evernote

 

My Google Website From the ACTEaz Workshop

July 16th 2010 Posted at Animationish, Conferences, CPS Clickers, eInstruction Interwrite Workspace, Jing, Livescribe, Livescribe, Mathcast, Mobi, Presentations
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Today I gave a 3 1/2 hour hands-on workshop on teaching with technology, in Tucson, AZ

Looking at the screenshot of my website for the workshop above, you can see the major topics were:

  • Animationish (FableVision Learning)
  • Google websites
  • Jing (TechSmith)
  • Livescribe Pulse smartpen
  • Workspace (eInstruction – comes with the Mobi)

To see the full workshop, along with all the materials presented, you can visit my google website for the workshop. During the workshop I presented with the Mobi, and had the participants often answer questions using the CPS Pulse clickers (eInstruction).   It was really a lot of fun!

If you view the workshop website, to have it make more sense, scroll down on the HOME page to see the schedule and follow the links IN ORDER that are in the schedule.   When you make a google website, the side links are alphabetical, NOT in the order I presented them in!

The workshop was in a computer lab, so each participant was on a laptop.  My 13 (soon to be 14) year old son was my technical helper during the entire workshop, walking around helping anyone who had questions.  He also taught the part of the workshop on Animationish!   He did a fantastic job and I was very grateful to have him with me!  I hope he can help me during my 8 hour workshop I am giving in October!  :)

 

CPS Pulse clickers and Workspace – great for immediate feedback!

May 24th 2010 Posted at CPS Clickers, eInstruction Interwrite Workspace, feedback, Mathcast, Mobi, Student participation, Technology
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I spent some time today playing with my eInstruction CPS Pulse (clickers) and the Mobi software called Workspace.   I wanted to create a short “how to” video on getting immediate feedback from your students while teaching a class.    One of the best features is that you don’t have to design the questions ahead of time!  In this video I will show you how to ask any question during class, get immediate feedback of your class as a whole, and then be able to look at more detailed feedback from individual students  at a later time.  You can do this at any point during the class, even when the students are asking questions about the homework!

here is a link to the YouTube video