This video is sponsored by Texas Instruments.
Here are three hands on math lessons
that you can try in your classroom.
First is a shape building activity
from a website that I love called YouCubed.
It is a hands on way to teach students
to be able to convince someone else of their mathematical reasoning.
Students are in groups of four and each group gets a string
that is tied off to make a loop.
They have a list of shapes
that they're trying to make with their string,
and everyone must have at least one hand on the rope.
But they can't untie the rope
and they have to use all of the rope to make the shape.
And so once the students
have actually made the shape with their string,
we then have the discussion on what it means to convince
someone that you indeed have made that shape.
We talk about as mathematicians,
you must first convince yourself,
do you believe that you have actually made this shape?
Then you must be able to convince a friend,
someone that maybe is going to probably
just accept your justification
because they care about you and they love you.
And then we talk about convincing a skeptic,
someone who may not be as easily swayed
unless you have good mathematical reasoning.
As a teacher, you get to play the role of the skeptic.
And so you can ask questions like,
how do you know that that's a square?
How can you prove that these two segments are congruent?
How can you prove that
these angles are actually 90 degrees?
You kind of get to play the role of a toddler
that just keeps asking why?
Or How do you know that
students may justify their statement
that it's a 90 degree angle
by putting it up to the corner of a wall and showing like,
Well, if we can assume that this wall is 90 degrees,
then that means this angle is also 90 degrees.
And this is your opportunity to talk to students
that mathematicians often make statements
and then they justify those statements as a form of proof.
Then after you do this for the rest of the year,
you can continue to use this language.
Like, can you convince me of that? Or What is your proof?
I love YouCubed.org
There are tons of activities like this, particularly
in their week of inspirational math segment
and I will link to this particular lesson down in the description.
Our second lesson is the 10 minutes of code
with Texas Instruments calculators.
These are really great entry point.
If you are wanting to begin to implement
coding in a math or science classroom,
the best place to get started with these is the
TI codes section of the Texas Instruments Education website.
From there, your students can pick which programing
language they would actually like to explore
either Python or TI basic.
I think TI basic is a really good
starting point for your first time coders,
and then you select which calculator
you're going to be working on,
whether it's any of these TI 84 plus calculators or
any of these TI Nspire CX calculators.
I'm going to jump into the one for the TI 84 plus calculators.
So you've got 2 10 minutes of code activities here.
I'm going to talk about the second one in just a bit,
but let's click on this first one,
which only requires your calculator.
Students can begin working through these modules at their own pace.
They have step by step guides
with written instructions as well as screenshots
of the actual calculator so students can ensure
that they are actually programing it correctly.
TI has made the coding on the calculator menu driven,
which means that students can actually go
through the menus of the different coding options
and then select different portions of the code that they want to include.
And so they don't have to physically type out
each little letter or symbol of their code and it allows students
to be able to experiment with different coding prompts
that maybe they haven't been introduced to yet.
While they are looking through those menu options
and thinking like, Oh, I wonder what this does?
And within a few minutes
your students are able to actually code a border
around their screen with a message in the middle of it
to take this coding that they're doing
with their calculator to the next level
you can incorporate the TI Innovator Hub.
This is where that second 10 minute of code segment comes in,
because these are all different codes
that you can do with the calculator
when it's attached to the Innovator Hub.
Right off the bat, students are learning
how to program a light
to show up on the Innovator Hub for a few seconds,
and within a few lessons,
they are creating a traffic light program that makes sounds
depending on what color light is showing.
And as basic as that seems,
there is this sense of accomplishment.
Even me, someone who's taught coding in robotics before,
it's like once I finally got to that level was like, All right,
I got the light to show up
with the sound that I wanted and overcame.
All these tiny little obstacles to get there is really satisfying
if your students are coding in TI Basic
and would prefer to work on a computer interface
rather than on the calculator, you can use the free
TI Connect CE software to connect your calculator to the
computer and then do the coding there.
And that's where I found myself doing more of the coding
and that's the interface that I preferred.
If you want to do even more in-depth
mathematical programing lessons,
you can implement the TI Innovator Rover,
and then you've got the calculator connected to the Innovator Hub,
which is connected to the rover.
TI’s got a bunch of lesson plans to guide you
through these explorations with the rover,
including their Drive the Line lesson, where they explore
multiple representations of position, a velocity and time
to write code that's going to navigate a set of challenges.
And they've also got one called the Two Rovers,
which is one that we did a video on last year,
which I think is a better way to teach the intersection
of two linear functions and a really concrete and hands on way.
So if you're already using these calculators,
it's an easy way to start coding.
And if you get the Innovator Hub and the rovers,
those are things that can also be utilized in something
like a make your space or a robotics class.
The third idea comes from Holly Clark, who posted something
on how you can get students
to create a TikTok showing what they have learned.
What I thought TikTok was just all about kids dancing.
Let me show you one math TikTok or MathTok
to give you an example.
Crazy math tricks that you need to know Part 3
If you are subtracting from a number with lots of zeros,
here's an easy fast way to do it
first minus one over here and over here.
So this top number becomes 7999
and this bottom number becomes 3728.
And then subtract, as you would, going from right to left.
So 1, 7, 2, 4
And that will be your answer.
So simple and as short as these videos can be,
there's often a good amount of thought that goes into them.
Creators have to think- How do I want to hook the viewer
with something interesting within the first few seconds of the video,
Notice the hook in this video.
Question 14 In the figure above, what is the value of X?
So right here we have a vertex that he adds right
at the beginning provokes some kind of curiosity, like, Oh,
I wonder if I would have gotten this one wrong.
Let me watch the rest to find out.
You just have to think, what value
do I want to deliver in this TikTok?
Is it going to be information?
Is it going to be entertainment?
Is it going to be infotainment?
Given the nature of these TikToks, they will be informative,
but you don't have to dance
to make them entertaining as well.
Take a look at this clip.
If you take a strip of paper in form
and into a loop, it's fairly predictable
what you'll get if you cut. It in half.
It keeps you engaged because even if you don't know
what the Mobius strip is having, the visual of the strip
there makes you wonder
where is where is he going with this?
This would not be nearly as engaging
if it was just someone talking to the camera about the Mobius strip.
Having students create a video in the style of TikTok
gives them an opportunity
to show what they know over giving them yet
just another multiple choice assessment.
You can do this on TikTok, but not all of your students may be on TikTok.
Your students may be even too young to have a TikTok.
Or maybe you really don't want to have to download TikTok.
And so I would recommend doing this activity in Microsoft Flip
and what Holly calls a FlipTok.
She created this template
that I'm going to link down in the description,
and it has students think through several of the things
that I was mentioning a little bit earlier,
and she even has them decide
what their call to action or their CTA will be at the end of the video.
And that's exactly what we do here on our YouTube channel.
Your call to action is to take this quiz
that we have created to help you learn
what are the actual 21st century teacher skills
that are your strength
and which skills are the areas of growth for you?
When you take the quiz,
we will send you a personalized report
giving you ideas of ways that you can continue
to level up as a teacher.