Yes! I am extremely excited because this year Pi Day will be bigger than ever!! Pi Day is of course celebrated nationally by math teachers and students on March 14th. I started the tradition of observing the special day at school— this year will be our 3rd annual celebration. In previous years I have gotten my students and other faculty members to order and wear Pi Day shirts on 3.14. I have also shown Pi videos, played Pi songs, and had students work on projects such as making Pi posters in my classes. This year is going to be amazing!!! Leading up to Pi day I will not only be giving my students many new activities to work on, but I will also be developing lessons for teachers of all subjects to use on that day. We are also selling Pi Day shirts in the bookstore that were designed by students. There will be a Pi contest to see who can memorize the most digits of Pi and there will be daily announcements made from now until Pi day with great facts about the mathematical constant. As we get closer to the big day I will be making updates so check back! Check out the links below for more information and get involved!!

Pi Day page on the Math Department Website that I will be updating soon.
My HomeworkNOW page on Pi Day that I will be continuing to update as Pi Day approaches.
My Del.icio.us bookmarks on Pi Day that I add to any time I find useful or interesting information on Pi.

For anyone who is interested in getting an interactive whiteboard, but is a little short on funds, take a look at these websites to find out how you can put together your own system for considerably less money….

Multi-touch Whiteboard Under 100 Dollars- Using the Wii Remote
Video of Wii Remote/Multi-touch Whiteboard on YouTube
Johnny Chung Lee’s Website

Can you say AMAZING?!?! I wonder if you can use the Wii remote to create a cheaper version of the Airliner Slate and/or the Senteo (Senteo features)…

I started the Math Department website last year and have been constantly working to add content and improve the design. I have been frustrated by the inability to add to the site from work as well as the inability to easily allow the rest of the Department to contribute directly to the site. I’ve been looking around to see what’s the best and easiest way to change the structure of the site and have decided on using a blog to build the site. Not only can I add the Math Department faculty as contributers to the blog, but it will be possible to post from work. Plus, I’m a lot happier with the look of the site. And it will be possible to change the design in the future without having to spend the time figuring out CSS. Which is great, because while I would love to be able to learn how CSS works and use it, I just don’t have time to invest in that project right now!!! Here’s a link to the old site, and again here’s the link to the new site. If you have an opinion either way, ideas, questions of comments– let me know!!

Other news, I am looking forward to the classes that I have signed up to take during the spring semester ‘08. I will be taking Physical Computing (3 credits), Computers and Technology for Educators (3 credits), Graphics and Multimedia (3 credits), and an Eyebeam workshop (one day inservice workshop on technology). Needless to say, it’s going to be a very busy semester!! I plan on spending most of my Christmas break trying to get everything in place on the Math Department Website as well as with the blogging and podcasting projects that I’m working on…. That way I’ll be able to focus on those classes and not get overwhelmed!! So, we’ll see how that goes Good thing I’m really great at multi-tasking! Seriously though, the great thing about these courses is that they are all project based, while I do very well in classes that are assessed through papers it’s really not my thing. I’m sure there will be some writing element to these courses, but the focus is on learning how to use and implement technology which is right up my alley. I can’t wait!!!!

One more item of interest, I’ve created a PageFlake. It’s a pretty cool idea because I’m not really sold on using G-Reader to keep up with blogs. Plus it’s easy to customize and yet another tool that can be shared, which is great Take a look and maybe sign up for your own account!!

Take care

Current status of projects….

I have been using SlideShare to embed PowerPoints presentations of notes on HomeworkNOW. You can take a look at the presentations I’ve uploaded here or check my HomeworkNOW pages.

I have not posted any more resources on my blog recently because I am working on researching school blogging policies. Before I can implement blogging in my classes there needs to be guidelines established!! I plan on using my classroom blog to showcase projects that students have created* (which also necessitates parent release forms). I also plan on using the blog as a forum for students to post class notes and discussions. If you’d like to find out more, you can view the information here. I will be preparing a draft on blogging policy soon, I am hoping that other teachers will contribute before I forward it to our Dean of Faculty and then on to the administration.

* During the year I have my students work on projects that incorporate writing across the curriculum and active learning techniques. For example, the first project that my freshmen and sophomores worked on was a paper that summarized a math, science, or technology article (which they presented to the class) and included a poster displayed in the classroom. It was exciting to see the level of enthusiasm that the students had in not only completing the project but also in the class discussions that came about when students presented. Giving the students a chance to make connections between math and science as well as encouraging them to develop better writing skills was a great experience for both me and my students

Another project that I assigned involved the students creating their own word problem involving motion, coin, or age problems covered in Math A. After writing the word problem, the students then created a PowerPoint presentation that included the problem, solution, and use of design features such as graphics and animation. Wow! The response to this assignment was amazing! The students did such a great job not only on the math part of the project, but on the overall design as well. I can’t wait until we are able to post their finished presentations on the class blog– and neither can they!! They are proud of the work they have done and the beautiful presentations they’ve created and rightly so!!

I am looking forward to our next project. My students are as well, and I think that the excitement stems from the opportunity to not only do hands on work, but also for the chance to be creative. I have found that these projects are helpful in motivating students to go beyond the standard curriculum and also in fostering a sense of curiosity and understanding of mathematical applications and relevance.

Well, that’s all for now!!
Take care
Kristen

Take a look at this voicethread posted on Darren Kuropatwa’s blog “A Difference”. In it he responds to five questions on blogging. For those of you who want to learn more about blogging this is a great resource. You can also take a look at the comment that I left after his post (technovore).

Also, an update on the page I posted on Web 2.0— I have been asked by the Dean of Faculty to make a presentation to the faculty advisors and administration at one of their regularly scheduled meetings. The focus of the presentation will be on showing how to use blogging as a tool to collaborate/share resources with colleagues as well as discussing how it can be used in the classroom. My hope is that this will start a movement among our faculty to begin using more technology to support teaching. More about this soon!!!