Week 5

This week in MATHS 331, I played with the Nspire more. I began researching more activities for the Nspire on various websites. The best one I could find was www.timath.com. It has some of the activities that we already have posted on my iLocker, but it also has complete lists of activities separated by content area (Algebra, Pre-Algebra, Pre-Calculus, Geometry, etc.). It was very useful because it had teacher's notes and student notes. Hopefully, this website will prove very useful to our group.

We're supposed to write about our attitude on using technology in the classroom. I honestly think my view has changed. As I've mentioned several times in my various blogs and reading responses, I did not originally have a high opinion of using technology in the classroom. I grew up with very little access to technolgy; in fact, I never used a graphing calculator until Calculus in high school. I thought that since I learned math without much technology, then my students wouldn't need it to understand either. Through the readings and discourse with my peers and Dr. Shafer, I'm slowly coming to the realization that times are changing. Math is a difficult subject for most students to grasp, and that maybe a lot of students do need some visualization or some technology to help them make connections. I also think that with all the changing technology coming out constantly, it is beneficial for us to instruct our students on using various technologies because, chances are, they will be using those technologies or other technologies in their future professions. If they don't see how the technologies are used, they'll never learn about it and they will be behind their peers. It was something I hadn't thought of before this semester.

I also think that I still have some fears about technology in the classroom. The big thing for me is over-reliance on the technology. The most obvious fear is the students' dependence on the technology. Mr. Pinkerton brought this out when he mentioned that his students made connections and discoveries when using the technology, but they couldn't transfer these connections or make new ones back in the classroom. The application and evaluation of their knowledge didn't pass on to the standard classroom setting. Another less obvious fear is the over-reliance on technology on the part of the teacher. Mr. Pinkerton also brought this out when he said that he wasn't sure if he could teach at a school that didn't have access to technologies. This concerns me because I don't want to depend too much on technology. I still want to retain the basic methods of pedagogy and still maintain my understanding of the material. My goal with technology is to increase my students' (and my own) understandings of the material with the technology, not completely create understandings with the technology.

I'm getting more familiar with the Nspire. I'm still not completely sure on how to do specific functions, but I feel that I am discovering new things every time I turn on the Nspire. I keep watching various Youtube videos on the functions of the calculator, and each one builds on the previous video. I think my biggest "AHA" moment with the Nspire was figuring out how to open and save programs. This is a simple, yet huge, function of the calculator. The Nspire functions very similarly to a small computer, in that you must open tabs or "documents." These documents can be saved just like a file on your computer. It's pretty neat, but I'm still learning about it as well. It was also an "AHA" moment for me just to figure out how to open a blank document so I could do simple calculator functions like addition, multiplication, and trigonometric functions. This is also very important since most students would probably use the calculator for these purposes. I would still like to learn more about graphing things and syntax of the calculator. I'm still discovering what certain keys do and what some symbols mean. As I continue to use the Nspire, I'm discovering that 1.) it's very difficult to learn and probably wouldn't be all that practical in a classroom if not used on a daily basis and 2.) the Nspire can do a lot more functions than previous graphing calculators and probably will not be able to be used on common standardized tests in the near future (if ever). I still think it has its purposes though.