Applets & Tech activities
'Use of technology to significantly enhance the development, engagement and skillset of students in a 3rd Industrial (R)evolution '
People who work in mathematical or scientific fields today use technology to enhance the development of their work on a daily basis.
This session aims to look at uses of technology in education that significantly enhance the development of a task (when compared with traditional pencil and paper methods), or are simply not possible without it.
In what many scientists consider to be the "3rd industrial revolution" tests, and classrooms, can, and are, doing more to reflect these changes.
Resources
Equations of Lines
Students could be asked in a test to recreate the image above using geogebra/autograph/cabri/sketchpad or other software.
As everyone knows in today's modern world technology facilitates, "scaffolds" and enhances human capacities. This resource page:
presents a simple, but effective use of technology, in resolving a common difficulty students have with using equations to define mirror lines. It then goes on to show examples of the sorts of tasks that a technology enhanced education and assessment environment can offer.
Modelling Disease
Computer assessments could open up the possibility of short modelling investigation style questions (technical help "how to" videos being provided as an integral part of the exam):
Integrated technical help "how to" videos
Numerically Literate?
The ability to understand, analyse and interpret data is increasingly important in a technology rich age where the distribution and access to data is so quick and easy. This resource, from colleague Richard Wade, gives a further example of how technology provides the tools for finding solutions to the new questions and challenges our information technology era has created:
Rotation Obstacle Course
This activity is a good example of how software allows students to develop an understanding of this concept starting from their own, innate, intuition thanks to the quick experimentation that technology allows. The software interfaces then create a need for a more precise definition of the rotations. Both Geogebra and Autograph's interfaces can continually display the coordinates of the centre of rotation (and how these change as the centre changes) and require the student to input an angle and a direction.
For both the "Around the World" and "Jungle Obstacle" activities students should find there are a wide range of possible solutions. This opens up a great opportunity for discussions of the strategies used by different students.