Teaching Properties Associative, Commutative, Distributive, etc, Through Matching

Teaching any properties in math can be tough for educators. Properties as intuitive as Associative  Commutative, Distributive or as tough as the ones shown below are hard for students to memorize. 

(hosted at ecalc.com) 

And that's just what we need...a memory game!

Using flashcards (premade flashcards may be found here) have students play the old fashioned memory game.

1) Each student gets a turn to flip over two cards
2) If they match the proper property with its definition they keep the set of cards and go again. If they don't, its the other students turn
3) The Student who collects the most sets of cards, wins!

The same concept may be used to teach algebra properties. For example, the various definitions of perfect square trinomials and the difference of two squares. They too can be made to play in the same fashion.

Let me know how it goes :)

Teaching Simple Interest: Choosing The Best Deal

Teaching Simple Interest: 

I= prt

I =Interest, p = principle, r = interest rate (in decimal), t = time in years

Let's tell a story about a kid who wants to borrow $70.00. He has three choices to borrow the money, "mom and dad", "the bank" or "the loan shark"

Lets see who he chooses

Teaching Y-axis, Output, Range and Dependent Variable With The YORD

The YORD is a mythical creature that teaches students to remember y-axis, output, range, dependent variable. The video shows a pic of a potential YORD. See more at our website

Talking About A Math Lab

http://handsonmath.blogspot.com/2009/12/what-about-using-math-lab.html

I'm Working On A Sketch For Distributive Property

It's going to be about a detective who busts into a set of parenthesis and "distributes" punishment. Let me know what you think

Learning Whats A Function Through Text Messaging

Functions can be a hard concept to teach to primary and secondary students! Math Is Fun gives as good of a review as anyone. One of the hardest concepts for students to grasp in when a function is really a function and when it isn’t. If we are lucky enough to have a graph then we may simply use the vertical line test  but normally this is not the case, so, let me offer an analogy

Using text messaging for our example here are our definitions using inputs and outputs.

Function: Cell Phone

Input:  Cell phone numbers in our address (a)

Output: Sent text messages (TM)

Our Function is thus

TM = f(a)

Text massages are a function of what address we input.

Now we have a platform to teach our function concept. For additional questions, download the worksheet titled What is A Function in the math downloads section



Just finished revising the polygon workbook. It now has more directions and examples. Check it out! http://ping.fm/tA4b8

Is Your Secret Safe? Think Exponentially (Exponential Growth)

Is Your Secret Safe? Think Exponentially 

1st: Think and write a secret that you wouldn't want anyone to know about you, aside from a couple of dear close friends

2nd: Think of who those close friends, draw them and write their name under the picture (stickmen will work fine)

Names__________________

3rd: If in one day you tell each of your friends your secret, how many total people (aside from you) now know your secret?

______ total people in ___ day

4th: Now, if the next day each of your friends tell three of their friends, how many people now know your secret (aside from you)? Draw them underneath each of their friends

______ total people in ___days

5th: Now, lets say the following day each of these friends tell three friends. Now how many people know your secret? Draw them

______ total people in ___ days

6th: We can see how fast your rumor can spread right? Theres got to be a better way of calculating who will know your secret. 

In Walks Exponents :)

Exponents will quickly allow us to calculate how many people know your rumor 

Day 1: 3^1 know your secret 

Day 2: 3^2 know your secret (plus your original  3)

Day 3: 3^3 know your secret and so forth (plus your original 9)...

Our equation can be thought of as this 

# of people who know your secret = (how many people you tell) raised to the power of (how many people they tell) . As those who are told begin to tell others, the exponent grows. Don forget to factor in the original amount of people :)

Moral of the story? Keep your secrets with you or those you really trust

Additional Questions To Ask?

How long till you school or neighborhood knows your secret?

How long till the country know your secret?

How long till the world knows your secret? 

Got A Kindle? Read Surviving the Trenches of Education For $2.99

I'm working on volume 2 of Surviving The Trenches of Education but if you're not someone who likes to read the book online, you can kindle it for $2.99 (just click on the pic or go here http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004ASOSIS)

Available in Kindle For $2.99

Solving Equations Using Weigh Scales

The following is a hand drawn experiment, however, i believe it would best be received if the educators actually used a scale and a real doggy-bowl(or a paper bag) on both sides to represent the variable as well as actually manipulated the experiment so as to show how the scale must balance. Thus, i'm well aware that the hand drawn experiment here is flawed...but i think you'll get the idea :)

How Many Bones Are In The Dog Bowl

Use Algebra To Solve

Now look in the dog bowl to see if you are correct? 

Foldables: Study Organizers

I've always been a huge fan of foldables as study organizers. Here are the three that I used most often. Any suggestions?

Teaching the Value of the Pythagorean Theorem with a Football Field

Activity: Teaching the Value of the Pythagorean Theorem with a Football Field

You will need:

Yard sticks

Pen and paper

Clipboards
(Measure using inches to avoid added conversions)
Overview of Activity:

Students will be split into groups and placed at the four corners of the end zone of a football field. Using a yard stick students will measure how many yards are from one corner of the end zone to the other. After the activity, the students will be shown how they could have easily calculated the distance by simply using the Pythagorean Theorem.



Pre Activity:

1. How to measure using a yard stick.

2. How to keep record of each yard stick using tally marks



Activity:
1. Have Students split into four groups

2. Ask them to measure how many yard sticks reach from one corner of the end zone to the other (the hypotenuse of the triangle).

3. Place each group at each corner of the end zone and have them measure how many yards from one end zone to its diagonal.

4. Have them record their data
Post Activity:
1. Have students share their data and compare it to your own

2. Share the way you calculated the distance using the information that the field is a rectangle with a distance of 120 yards and a width of 50 yards)

3. A^2 + B^2 = C^2, A= 120, B= 50. C = Square root(16900)

4. Introduce the Pythagorean Theorem

5. Practice

Hiring Your Students As FBI Agents (Cool Way to Teach Area and Circumference of Circles)

Let face it, circles are just not that exciting for math students, especially the area and circumference of circles. 


Let’s change this...

First, hire all your students as FBI agents

Next, they must begin working immediately, as there’s an emergency. Somewhere in the school (you may use town if you would like) is a bomb with a blast radius of 500 feet!

Our job is twofold: We need to know how far back the citizens need to stand to insure their safety (circumference of a circle). Second we need to know what type of damage we are looking at (area of circle).

Now, have them imagine if they were faced with job calculating such information of a nuclear weapon with a blast radius of  plus or minus a mile (Good reference sites for blast radius here and here)

The Real Number Universe (The Realverse)

I must confess that i have a love for these Real Number themes. Here our latest variation, The Realverse.

An awesome idea would be for your students to list some crazy properties about each world. For example, in Natural World, everyone grows directly from 2 feet to 3 feet. Or, everyones age on the planet is in natural numbers

Here is The New Workbook For Teaching Polygons and Quadrilaterals

Available for download or paperback

Algebra With Toothpicks and Popsicle Sticks

Hands On Math Powerpoint (pics from our site)

Hands on Math Powerpoint

View more presentations from Jeremiah Dyke.

Absolute Value's and Magnets

Here is an awesome idea for helping young students remember that absolute values are positive numbers using magnets 

Materials Needed:

Magnets and popsicle sticks

Place two of the magnets under a piece of paper and glue them both south side up.

Label the third magnet negative 3 on the south end and positive 3 on the north end

Now drop the magnet as follows (see video) to show how absolute values are always positive

The Real Number System Zoo

There are tons of ways for teaching the real number system without relying simply on drill and kill. This is an awesome project. As you can see, nothing is labeled except the numbers themselves. This way your student must explain the project to you--helping him solidify his or her memory of the terms

Happy Meals and Math

I'm envisioning a double lesson here. Proportions & Volume/Area of Irregular Shapes (with a built in lesson, if you would like, on choosing the right quantity of food per serving).

Foremost, have your students bring in a happy meal box sometime within two weeks prior to the class, labeling everything that came in the box on the inside of the box with their name. You may want to swing by your local McDonald's and ask for extras for those who forget (don't forget to bring your teacher badge).

Next, you can go here and figure out the calories of each item. Or download the pdf

Next, have your students figure our what the proportion of calories in one Happy Meal is to their daily allotted proportion of calories per day , of which 2000 is probably a safe estimate. Happy Meal/Calories Per day Next, Looking at the shape of the Happy Meal box you can see an irregular figure Thus, have your students attempt to calculate the Area of the sides or Volume of the box. Good Luck!

The Real Number Diorama. Shoebox & Math

The Real Number Sea

This was fun. Notice that each of the foam sea creatures correlates in some way to the real number system.