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Matt’s Media Tips 11-13 Making the Math Magic Happen with Media When I was growing up math was the one subject that could always make me break out into a panic induced sweat. I learned math through rote and repetition and struggled to find the relevance. I used to be petrified of the day when my son or daughter asked me to help them with their math homework because that’s the day they would find out that dad’s not as smart as he was pretending to be. But today I see a completely different way of engaging the students like the me of the past. Access to digital media like interactive games, videos and songs help to differentiate instruction to learners like me and make math relevant. To celebrate this magic, this week is dedicated to making math a not-so-scary subject, engaging and meaningful. Something to sing about. There are 1418 songs within Discovery Education. 211 are about Math. These songs cover the gambit K-12 and many include teachers’ guides and lyrics. My favorite set of math songs come from Dr. Lodge McCammon - search “Lodge” and choose songs as your media type to find them. Lodge sings about many subjects, including Math, in a unique and contemporary way. I have two favorite Lodge songs when zero’ing in on math. “My (0,Y) Find” is a love song to slope. You can’t really get better than that. Unless the order of operations is more your thing. If that is your style then you need to check out his song entitled “The Value.” Not only do Lodge’s songs and lyric guides/activities make math more accessible and relevant, but they also open up the door for you to have students express
How am I doing? I would love to know your thoughts. Use this link to tell me!
themselves in creative ways. After all, what could be better than having your students perform interpretive dance to a song about the order of operations? Don’t believe me? Check these elementary students and their dance! Want to replicate this in your classroom? Check out this link to learn how. It Takes a Village Did you know that Discovery Education has built-in math tutors? Yep, there are over 11,000 Math Overviews and Explanations embedded into Discovery Education. Each Math Overview and Explanation includes a math educator walking through a specific math problem step-by-step with annotations. Since the media is digital it can be rewound, sped up, and/or paused at any point. And since it is within Discovery Education it can be assigned as homework to an individual student or whole class. That means that your students can now have 11,000+ math teachers on-demand. Great for remediation, great for extension, great for differentiation, this media is pretty special stuff. Even more Math Tutors WebMath might be one of my favorite resources within Discovery Education. And guess what? It is free. It doesn’t require a log-in. This means that anyone can access this terrific tool. Parents, grandparents, teachers, students, community members - anyone who can type in www.discoveryducation.com into their browser can find WebMath. When you land on the page, simply scroll over to the Parents tab and select WebMath. This will bring up a great tool for learning and reviewing math. You’ll find elementary items like counting coins to complicated things like Trig. and Calc. and everything in between. This tool is designed to help you find the solution by breaking down and explaining each part of any problem. Interacting With The Media Recently I came across an amazing math educator, Dan Myer, and his fantastic resources. If you haven’t had a chance to read Dan Meyer’s blog you’ll need to put it on your must read list - regardless of what subject you teach. Dan concentrates on engaging his students by combining “Concrete Concepts (what it is) with Concrete Tasks (what you do with it).” What I like most about Dan Myer is that he breaks down complicated math problems into chunks using interactive media, he demonstrates real world How am I doing? applications...and he ties it all to the Common Core. He shares all of his lessons, his Math in Three I would love to know your thoughts. Acts, with the world and invites others to collaborate with him and share their ideas. To see this Use this link to tell me! amazing list of resources check out Dan Myer’s Three-Act Math Tasks. My favorite - The Taco Truck.
Discovery Education Webinar Schedule
In keeping with my the math theme, I am
highlighting the Mathmateer Free (formerly Rocket Math Free) app this week. This app was created by the same guy who created the Stack the States and Stack the Countries apps.
Mathmateer Free (formerly Rocket Math Free) By Dan RussellPinson
Dates
Time (EST)
11/12
7pm 8pm
DE Science Elementary 101: Learn how to access and use reading passages and their accompanying eBooks, our interactive glossary, fundamentals, video segments, and 5-minute preps and more!
11/13
7pm 8pm
Discovery Education’s Social Studies Techbook: Experience the latest offering from Discovery Education designed to bring Social Studies instruction to the 21st century. Learn how to bring social studies alive through the use of digital media, primary and secondary sources and interactive tools.
11/13
7pm 8pm
What’s the 4-1-1? Teachers, Technology and the Common Core: Join us as we examine practical strategies for using digital content and technologies to engage students in today’s 21st Century classrooms.
11/13
8pm 9pm
Students as Curators: Managing New Information in the Digital Classroom: Join us as we explore a new category of web-based tools, tools for curating information, and see how these tools allow students to work together.
11/14
7pm 8pm
Somersaulting the Classroom: Experimenting with the idea of a flipped classroom model? The Somersaulting the Classroom approach is for educators who have a desire to integrate the flipped teaching strategy, but are not quite ready to burst into a total flip.
11/15
7pm 8pm
Building Your Lesson With Discovery Education Science Techbook: Join the Discovery Education Science Techbook team as we build a media-infused science lesson presentation that you can use in your classroom. Each month we will demonstrate how to create a truly engaging lesson presentation using digital resources and PowerPoint/ Keynote
After building and customizing your rocket you take your crew on a number of different missions, solving math problems along the way. From their site: Play one of the many fun math missions. Each mission has touchable objects floating in space, including stars, coins, 3D shapes and more! Earn a bronze, silver or gold medal and also try to beat your high score. Missions range in difficulty from even/odd numbers all the way to square roots, so kids and their parents will enjoy hours of fun while learning math. MATH MISSIONS: ▸ Numbers ▸ Telling Time ▸ U.S. Money ▸ 3D Shapes ▸ Arithmetic
Questions/Comments? I’d love to hear from you email me at matt_monjan@discovery.com or Tweet me at @monjan
Here is the link to access the app.
What is a DEN Star Member? The Discovery Educator Network (DEN) is a global community of educators passionate about teaching with digital media, sharing resources, collaborating, and networking. With over 100,000 members providing professional development to over 600,000 educators worldwide, the DEN connects teachers both on-line and in-person. Discovery Educators have exclusive access to a wide range of resources, professional development activities, networking opportunities, exclusive Discovery Educator events and more. Find out how you can be part of this dynamic and supportive community. Become a DEN Star today!
Link
Miss a week? Catch back up here! 2012-2013 School Year Archives 9/24/2012 Five free tools from DE plus one 11/5/2012 It’s a Date! Five Unique Ways to Use that’s too cool for school. We’ll the Calendar: This edition explores how also explore links to even more the Discovery Education Interactive free resources and then play with a Calendar is being used in new and free mobile app, Sketch Nation unique ways. We'll also examine Studio, that provides a simple Capzels - a free interactive timeline tool game design/creation platform. and mobile app and list a whole host of upcoming webinars 9/17/2012 Downloading Closed Captions Explore how to download closed 10/29/2012 A Hauntingly Good Edition. I highlight captioned files and manipulate some of the not-so-scary things that I their text on both a PC and Mac. learned at the recent Discovery We'll also examine the Educator Network Fall Virtual TechChef4U app that links to Conference. We'll also check out a host many education apps! Finally, in of great webinars and a very cool this edition, I provide links to the iPrompter app. Best of Matt's Tips and Tricks 10/22/2012 Get Your Game On! Explore how to use webinar resources. the Discovery Education games to 9/10/2012 In-the-know about Infographics. engage students. Robert Nay a 10th This edition highlights the new grade game designer will share his story 2012 election material within DE. It and his insights into the game design also dives into different ways that process. Finally, we'll check out you and your students can Aurasma, a free augmented reality app evaluate and explain data by that works on both Droid and IOS examining three different sites that devices. create infographics. Sock 10/15/2012 The Digital Decoder Part two of two Puppets, an iPad app that is explores how to use Discovery animated by your voice, is also Education and six other digital explored. resources to help students predict, restate, and make connections to the text 9/4/2012 Opening up Closed Captions. Check out all of the new and that they are reading. We'll also explore enhanced ways to stream a free mobile app called Fotobabble captioned content. We’ll also that lets add narration to your pictures. continue to explore the back-to10/8/2012 The Digital Decoder. Part one of a two school webinars and play with part series that explores how to use EasyBib, an Android and iPad app digital resources to assist struggling that makes citing reference readers. We’ll also explore Audioboo, material a breeze. a free mobile app that turns your mobile 8/27/2012 Back to School Review. Check out device into a roaming podcasting some of the major enhancements machine made to Discovery Education over 10/1/2012 Getting Quizzy With It. Everything you the summer. We'll give you a ever wanted to know about creating a chance to weigh in, showcase a Discovery Education Quiz and more new back to school webinar series including an easy step-by-step guide for and highlight Nearpod, a very cool embedding Web 2.0 content into a Quiz! classroom mobile app. We’ll explore a unique mobile app called Stack the States as well.
Miss a week? Catch back up here! 2011-2012 Archives 7/19/2012
Sneak peek at the back to school enhancements. Roadshow app.
6/11/2012
Fun things to do over the summer with technology and media. Mustacheme app is featured.
5/21/2012
The ins and outs of Digital Storytelling. Digital Storytelling Web 2.0 presentation and apps
5/14/2012
Who Knew We Had News? Find an additional set of free Discovery News videos, the Video Yearbook, video almanac, and great webinar information. Roadshow App for playing back videos on-demand is reviewed.
5/7/2012
4/30/2012
4/23/2012
My Five Favorite Summer Resources. We explore five free interactive sites that parents, students, and teachers can use over the summer. We’ll also explore a free translation app for mobile devices. Getting Your Game On. Finding great games, simulations and more within Discovery Education. Back-toSchool Sneak Peek Webinars announced. Futaba Classroom Games for Kids iPad app explored. Getting the Point with PowerPoint and Keynote. Learn how to trim audio & video in PPT and save both PPT & Keynote presentations as images to embed in Web 2.0 sites. 2 Screens and Joinme mobile presentation apps explored.
4/16/2012
It’s all about the Theme. We’ll explore several different ways to find unique thematic content. Three most voted upon stories revealed. Studyblue mobile flashcard app highlighted
4/9/2012
Scratch and Pop. Six-Word Story finalists revealed. Links between Discovery Education and
4/2/2012
3/26/2012
3/19/2012
3/12/2012
2/27/2012
Scratch.mit.edu, Popplet.com and EduTechr mobile app explored.
1/18/2012
Mi Content es Su Content. Bookmarking and sharing your Discovery Education content across your school and district, two great contests, and two text-to-sign mobile apps
In a Class of Their Own Setting up Discovery Education Classrooms, Discovery Education Live Webinars, Quizlet App.
1/9/2012
Building out the New Year Five of my favorite things you can do with the Discovery Education Builders, Rover App for DE Students
12/19/2011
Special Holiday Edition 13 Tips from Educators around the US and Canada, Videolicious App
12/12/2011
50 Ways to Use Discovery Education Tips and tricks galore iSwifter - Flash for iPads
11/28/2011
What I am Thankful for Building out your PLN Wordspree and Math Acorn Apps
11/14/2011
Things I Stole From the Community DEN Tips, Four really cool tips you can do with Google. TED and Animoto apps
11/7/2011
First Six Weeks Aggregated
11/4/2011
Creating an “iCenter" How to create an ePub using DE videos. Spirit of Innovation Challenge
10/24/2011
Spooky Edition Digital Storytelling, Web 2.0 Piqua City Community Night, Crazy Pumpkin and Halloween Card Creator Apps
10/17/2011
Stick it to IT Collaborative Note Taking Site Educator Spotlight - Jennifer Everett, ToonTastic and PuppetPals Apps
10/3/2011
Opening Up Closed-Captions Closed-Captions for Macs and PCs, 10 FAQs Customer Service Receives
9/26/2011
Common Core, Web 2.0 and DE Three cool sites that integrate nicely with Discovery Education. Administrator Spotlight - Molly Hay!
9/13/2011
Can you Hear what I’m Writing? Embedding an eReader into your Writing Prompts, Getting to know Discovery Education SCIENCE
Can You Picture it? Learn how to create a six-word story using iPiccy.com and Discovery Education. Digital Story Challenge! MeeGenius Audiobook app for mobile devices. Audio Book ‘em Dano. Eight simple steps for creating an audiobook using iTunes and any computer (Mac/PC). Molecules mobile apps. It’s All About The Sharing. Uploading, sharing and accessing your own content within Discovery Discovery Education. Cel.Ly app polling device via any device. Teacher Center Treasure Trove of Resources. Interactive Calendar Atlas, STEM Connect explored. Socrative App (student response).
2/13/2012
Special Valentines Issue - Things I love about Discovery Education. Five Minute Preps, Images,Coaches Eye App
2/6/2012
What did you say? Closed Captioning on an iPad? Getting Closed Captions to play on your iPad, GreenScreens on iPhone/iPad with GreenScreen FX app
1/30/2012
1/23/2012
Let’s Give Them Something To Sing About Differentiated Instruction Using Songs, First Student Media Contest of the Year, ShowMe and Educreations whiteboard apps Meet the Faces of Discovery Education Get up close and personal with the Discovery Education on-air talent, special student webinar series, Story Kit app