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Finding various resources to stay current technology trends can mean new blogs that are run by reputable professionals or reading through more academic-based literature such as research studies. I personally struggle to integrate technology into my math class effectively and have found the following blogs to help keep ideas fresh and lesson planning intentional.
http://mathandmultimedia.com/2013/02/16/techie-math-blogs/

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6 Technology-Rich Math Blogs By Techie Teachers

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Mathematics and Multimedia has been providing you with technology resources for teaching and learning mathematics for the past three years. If you are going to ask me to list other math blogs simi...

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A PLN is not only a desire but a necessity to stay abreast of the changes in the classroom and the benefits that technology can provide when used appropriately. 

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A PLN is not only a desire but a necessity to stay abreast of the changes in the classroom and the benefits that technology can provide when used appropriately. 

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https://www.teachthought.com/pedagogy/why-every-teacher-needs-a-professional-learning-network/

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by TeachThought Staff

What's a professional learning network?

According to Marc-André Lalande, "a Personal Learning Network is a way of describing the group of people that you connect with to learn their ideas, their questions, their reflections, and their references."

Of course, your PLN is not limited to online interactions, but their always-on availability makes them powerful. Further, the diversity of voices available in a truly global professional learning network makes it possible-and at times necessary-to consider divergent perspectives and thus, over time, become empathetic, connected, and prone to personal and professional growth.

As for this graphic? You can thank Sylvia Duckworth, who always does a great job sharing simple sketch notes to help teachers. (She also took our 12 Rules of Great Teaching and created a predictably wonderful graphic to supplement the text, among others.) We've taken the graphic and provided starting points for each 'reason' a teacher needs a PLN.
10 Reasons Every Teacher Needs A Professional Learning Network 1. Find great resources, lesson plans, and conferences
Consider: OER Commons Resources
2. Share your resources & ideas
Consider: 23 Ways To Use The iPad In PBL
3. Following amazing educators and their blogs
Consider: 52 Education Blogs You Should Follow
4. Get support when needed
Consider: An example like clarifying the difference between 'doing projects' and PBL
5. Make international connections
Consider: Project-Based Learning in your classroom
6. Flatten your classroom walls
Consider: Why Learning Through Social Networks Is The Future
7. Collaborate globally on projects
Consider: 50 Ideas For Using Skype In The Classroom
8. Find round-the-clock inspiration
Consider: Follow your favorite blogs on instagram-edutopia or TeachThought for example.
9. Learn the latest trends in education
Consider: The most popular twitter hashtags in education
10. Never run out of ideas for new things to try with your students 10 Reasons Every Teacher Needs A Professional Learning Network; image attribution flickr user sylviaduckworth

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10 Reasons Every Teacher Needs A Professional Learning Network

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A personal learning network is a group of people you connect with to learn from through their ideas, questions, backgrounds, and references.

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In regards to finding the time and space in which to collaborate with peers and colleagues about the ever changing world of education and the integration of technology, it is important to create a space that is useful and helpful for its members. The use of guidelines, norms etc and a mixture of possible ways to join such as in person or online can allow collaboration within your local community or educators across the world.
The influx of input from fellow educators and professionals that can assist in the best pedagogical approaches to integrating technology into the classroom is enormously beneficial.
https://www.edutopia.org/article/creating-effective-professional-learning-communities/

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If managed well, these teams can help teachers innovate in the classroom and improve student outcomes.

Bob Daemmrich / Alamy Stock Photo

Many teachers work to guide students to take academic risks that will help them learn. Can schools apply that idea to teacher learning as well?

The answer may be found in the collaboration achieved in professional learning communities (PLCs). PLCs-which harness "an ongoing process in which educators work collaboratively in recurring cycles of collective inquiry and action research to achieve better results for the students they serve"-are a common and proven practice to promote teacher collaboration that increases student achievement.

However, it is possible to fall into collaborative work that stifles innovation. This can happen, for example, if PLCs focus too heavily on common assessments and a common understanding of what students are learning, leading to common everything-students getting the same lesson plan in each class. I've heard administrators use the term "common experience" when setting expectations for teaching and learning. That strikes me as going too far.

Although this is grounded in wanting to ensure student success through consistency, it can stifle innovation, and one of the purposes of a PLC is to try out new strategies. The PLC is designed for teacher learning, and thus the team must balance risk taking and teacher autonomy with shared expectations for student learning. It's important that teachers in a team have that clear understanding of purpose so that everyone feels safe to take risks.

A learning team constantly engages in a cycle of learning: analyzing data, setting goals, and learning individually and collaboratively, as well as implementing and adjusting practices to meet the needs of all learners. This process allows teachers to try new teaching practices and discover what's working and what isn't.

Determining Common Learning and Assessments

In PLCs, the fundamental questions teachers explore are: "What do we want students to learn?" and "How will we know if they have learned it?" These questions are foundational to any PLC, as they require teachers to come to a common understanding of the learning as well as common assessments that check for understanding.

PLC make this happen by prioritizing standards using specific criteria and then unpacking those standards, analyzing the nouns and verbs in the standards to understand which skills and concepts students will need to learn in order to be successful. Teachers identify what is hard to teach and what is hard to learn in the standards so that they can anticipate interventions and extensions.

It's important to note that parts of this process call for tight alignment between teachers and don't allow for the creativity and autonomy teachers may be used to. In order to achieve success for students, we do need some common practices. However, by agreeing as a team on what should be tightly aligned, we can set the stage for teacher autonomy and exploration of the art of teaching and instructional practice.

Making Space for Innovation

A PLC is constantly trying out new strategies to improve student learning, so individuals within the team must be given space to innovate. This is where the PLC should be only loosely aligned.

Teachers can never know what teaching works best for their students unless they are given the freedom to try out new strategies. PLCs can make this happen by having teachers collect evidence from common assessments and using data protocols to determine which strategies were most effective.

Ensuring That Teams Work Effectively

Sam Kaner coined the term Groan Zone to describe the space between a problem being posed and a solution being reached, and he described the divergent and convergent thinking that occurs there. Sometimes teachers in a PLC are afraid to engage in conflict or explore different ideas, worrying that even productive conflict signals that one is "not a team player." Conversely, teachers may feel pressured to get work done and feel they don't have time to spend in conflict.

But productive conflict can allow us to build better ideas and stronger teams, and PLCs should embrace productive conflict and create a space for it in order to innovate. PLCs can make this happen with clear norms as well as protocols to ensure that all voices are heard and that it is safe to engage in this conflict. It's also helpful to make sure the projected outcome of a meeting is clear: Are we "generating ideas" or "making a decision"? This clarity can make space for open conversation.

PLCs need strong facilitators in order to engage in conversations that promote learning, risk taking, and innovation. However, the facilitators or leaders of those teams may be torn between advocating for ideas and managing the complex process of moving the team forward. This can lead to situations where team members have a facilitator who is strongly advocating for an idea rather than allowing for all voices to be heard, and team members may not feel safe to speak up or take risks. If facilitators need to advocate, they should select someone else to facilitate, in order to continue to balance advocacy for new ideas against team consensus and integration.

I recommend clear decision-making process like the Gradients of Agreement structure, which allows for decision making that honors the Groan Zone and divergent thinking while still moving toward convergent thinking and consensus decision-making.

PLCs are the lifeblood of innovation and risk taking in school. When structured well, they can be teams that constantly learn together and work to discover what is best for students.

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If managed well, these teams can help teachers innovate in the classroom and improve student outcomes.

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How to use technology effectively with math content

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How to use technology effectively with math content

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https://shakeuplearning.com/blog/ways-use-technology-math-classroom/

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Some math teachers struggle with integrating technology into the classroom. So, I enlisted the help of my friend and edtech expert, Craig Klement, to share 10+ Ways to Use Technology in the Math Classroom.

Integrating technology in the math classroom can go far beyond substitution, digital worksheets, and simple quizzes.

In this blog post and podcast episode, my guest, Craig Klement, will share free tools, templates, and lesson ideas you can use across grade levels.

Together, we will explore some of our favorite G Suite tools, Pear Deck, Desmos, Flipgrid, and more!

Hang on tight, because Craig has a TON of ideas and links to share with you!
Listen to the podcast version (audio) of this post using the player below:
. ..

Shoutout

Congratulations to Barbara Sutelan, a newly Level 1 Google Certified Educator.

Barbara is also a graduate of the Shake Up Learning Google Certification Academy. You can learn more about the online courses and grab some free Google Certification resources at GetGoogleCertified.com.

Do you have a question or idea to share on the podcast? Leave me a message here.

Craig Klement shares 10 ways to use technology in the math classroom that go beyond just making it a paperless classroom.

We have the capabilities to learn and engage students in new ways and create more dynamic learning experiences than were previously possible.

Using technology in math can be so much more than just annotating digitally. Although it may seem cool, it's not an improvement in learning. On s ome apps and devices, it's actually much more difficult to write on a screen instead of paper.

Google Slides tip: Give everyone edit access to a Google Slide deck through Google Classroom. Ask students to take a picture of their paper and insert it on a slide. The teacher can see everyone's thinking in one place, provide feedback in the comments, and allow students to critique the reasoning of others (peer feedback).

Desmos originated as an online graphing calculator, but now you will find interactive lessons for many grade levels.

The Fractions Challenge - "In this activity, students will practice adding and subtracting fractions. They will create expressions to match given criteria (e.g., the greatest value, the least positive value, etc.). Students will reason abstractly and structurally, arguing that their expressions are the greatest or least possible."

Adding Whole Numbers - "n this activity, students practice adding whole numbers in the context of a card game. The goal of the game is to create two groups of cards, each with the same sum. Whoever uses the most cards wins!"

Talking Time - "This activity helps students understand the different ways that people talk about time. They will read different descriptions of time-for example 5:15, 15 after 5, or a quarter after 5-and try to set a clock to that time. Teachers will see which time formats are easier or harder for students."

Desmos just released some more elementary activities! Click here to view.

Elementary

Taco Trucks- "In this activity, students use the Pythagorean Theorem as a tool to solve problems involving diagonal distances. In a quick prelude, students reason with the Pythagorean Theorem and rates in a situation that they may encounter in their daily lives: taking a shortcut to save time. Students then determine the best path to a Taco Truck from a spot on the beach. The activity culminates in a class-wide race!"

Polygraph: Parabolas - Ask questions to guess which graph your classmate picked.

Marbleslides: Lines - "In this delightful and challenging activity, students will transform lines so that the marbles go through the stars. Students will test their ideas by launching the marbles, and have a chance to revise before trying the next challenge."

Sketchy derivatives for Calculus - "In this activity, students respond to a variety of graph-sketching prompts to demonstrate (and deepen) their understanding of the graphs of derivatives."

Retro Desmos by Kurt Salisbury and John Rowe

Secondary
Alice Keeler's Templates for Elementary Math

Alice Keeler is a former math teacher, and she often shares many ideas and templates you can use in class. Here are a few that Craig recommends:

Flipgrid is a video response tool (and so much more). In math, students can explain their thinking and how they have solved a problem on video-even holding up their paper in front of the camera.

This is a great strategy for any grade level and helps students learn how to communicate using mathematical language.

With Pear Deck, you can take any Google Slides presentation, add interactive questions, or embed websites directly into your lesson, and send it to student devices so they can participate in real-time while you present.
Stacey Roshan's post on using Flipgrid in Calculus.
The basic version of Pear Deck is free, but my listeners can now get a complimentary 60-day trial of Pear Deck Premium with no credit card required.

This will give you access to features like the teacher dashboard, personalized takeaways, and more.

Pear Deck has a collection of math templates that your students will love, including "Which One Doesn't Belong," drawing number lines, shapes, and more!
Pear Deck Math Templates
Check out this video below for a quick overview:

HIGHLIGHTS
0:27 - Which of these doesn't belong
2:19 - Showing Work and Discussing Different Approaches
3:45 - Geometry
4:13 - Graphing
5:17 - Verbalizing Reasoning
5:45 - Desmos Calculator Embed
6:41 - Number Slide

Using the Pear Deck drawing tool in math:

Identify a shape

Label the parts of a shape

Number lines

Use a blank slide to have students annotate

Use a coordinate plane as a background and have students graph an equation

Guided Class Discussion in Pear Deck

Purposefully display wrong answers anonymously
What might have caused the student to think this way? Talk through it as a class.

Draggable
Agree/Disagree, Function/Not a function, rational/irrational, even/odd, drag different shapes

Besides just using Google Forms for a quiz or regular assessment, you can take advantage of the branching functionality.

This is called "Go to Section Based on Answer," meaning based on how students answer the question, they are taken to a different page.

For instance, if a student gets the answer incorrect, they can be taken to a page that will reteach the skill. This is assessment FOR learning.

I have a post that goes into this branching idea in detail here: How to Differentiate Questions in Google Forms.

This feature also lets us do some other fun things like "Choose Your Own Adventure," style forms, as Mandi Tolen shares in this blog post.

Craig created this Road Trip Activity and guest post for Ditch That Textbook-inspired by this episode on Google My Maps on The Google Teacher Tribe Podcast.

Craig developed this activity for a group of seniors to prepare for a test that wasn't required and used Google My Maps as a choice board with activities on different locations on the map.

Each "pit stop" included a different activity to help them review for the exam. Make it fun and let them listen to some road trip music and bring some snacks!

Using the Frayer Model to Teach Math Vocabulary

The Frayer Model is a graphic organizer for building vocabulary skills. The options can vary but generally look like Alice Keeler's example below.

Craig likes to create a collaborative slide deck (one deck that every student in the class can edit), and assign each student (or group) a vocabulary word and a slide. Then he would facilitate a scavenger hunt for examples at school and take a picture to insert on their graphic organizer.

Here's Alice Keeler's Frayer Model Template.

What Do You Do When You Aren't 1-1?

Craig has several suggestions for those who struggle with getting enough devices for all of your students to do activities like the ones above.

Craig suggests setting up stations using the device(s) you have available and have students work in groups or rotate to other non-tech activities. You could also use station time to pull students for small group instruction.

"Plickers is a free, interactive tech tool that uses printable "paper clickers" instead of clicker devices. Each student is assigned a unique Plickers card that has a black and white image similar to a QR code."

Plickers is a great low-tech option for checking for understanding and assessing student work.

"Doceri is the professional iPad interactive whiteboard and screencast recorder with sophisticated tools for hand-drawn graphics and built-in remote desktop control. "

Craig used Doceri in his one-iPad classroom to help students solve a problem or find a mistake while projecting so the whole class can learn together.

He loved handing over the iPad to let the students lead the class and talk about learning and even learn from mistakes.

Other Recommended Resources

Podcast Question of the Week

How can you use technology to go beyond simple substitution for paper?
Recommended Books for Math Teachers
Post your answer to your favorite social media platform using the hashtag #ShakeUpLearning, or share it in the Shake Up Learning Community on Facebook!

About Craig Klement

I am the RTI Facilitator at Garland High School. I get to meet with struggling students and collaborate with teachers and parents to help these students become successful. Another big aspect of my job is helping coach teachers and trying to improve learning at my school.

I taught on level and intervention math for 8 years (6 in Louisiana and 2 in Texas) and spent 1.5 years as an edtech coach. I believe in using technology to transform the learning experience for students. I am also a Certified Google for Education Trainer and use Google tools to help me work smarter, not harder.

Life with my family is never boring. My beautiful wife and 4 wonderful children keep me going. The highlight of my day is coming home to running feet, hugs and kisses, or even surprise water balloon attacks. I am an amateur softball coach for my oldest daughter. We love reading books, playing LEGOs, and playing outside.

© Shake Up Learning 2023. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog's author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Kasey Bell and Shake Up Learning with appropriate and specific direction to the original content on ShakeUpLearning.com. See: Copyright Policy.

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10+ Ways to Use Technology in the Math Classroom

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Integrating technology in the math classroom can go far beyond substitution, digital worksheets, and simple quizzes. In this blog post and episode, my guest, Craig Klement, will share 10 ways to use technology in the math classroom. You will learn about free tools, templates, and lesson ideas you can use across grade levels.

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https://www.iste.org/standards/iste-standards-for-teachers

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The ISTE Educator Standards challenge educators to deepen their practice, empower students and rethink traditional approaches to education.