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nedu: Smart Rooms (and beyond)
See also:  
           -[Meetings]- (including recitation)
                           
           -[zix teaching methods]- (teaching folder)
              -[Traditional Maths topics]-
           -[nedu:  Approximately]- (1 = 0; approximately)
           -[LKits]- (Learning Kits)
        
nedu: Smart Rooms (and beyond)
On this Page:  {nedu - Intro}
               {Web Sites} (and blogs, forums)
               {Digital Cameras/Scanners}
               {Smart Boards}
               {Links}

               
 

Smart Rooms: Intro

In a sense, there is nothing new about so-called
"smart rooms". The idea is to place at the 
disposal of the students/particpants in the room
as many "gadgets" to assist in learning or holding
meetings.

Every teacher has "dressed" the room to make it
stimulating - in some cases (eg, a chem lab) this
"dressing" is a necessity. In other cases, it
tells one and all: It's time to get to work!

We assume that as with *all* classrooms, there isn't
enough money to get evenything that we want, but as
Marie Montessori has shown, this negative can be 
taken as a positive: When students/particpants must
share a limited number of resources it causes
several things to happen:

 1) Respect for the equipment and more importantly
    for other people. To allow all to use the
    systems more efficiently and in a synergistic
    way.
  
 2) It forces students to PLAN their work more 
    carefully - if the "turn around time" whne
    the next chanse someone has to use a given
    resource is long, then you have to use your
    time effectively.

Note: We take as read the ideas of:

      Jean Paiget's "Genetic Eduction" theories
      Gardner's ideas of "Multiple Intellegences"
      and of course Montessori's ideas and teachings.

As each new piece of equipment is added to the room,
then it becomes an exponential problem (a happy one)
to put it to the most effective use. 


  

Web Sites
 
(and blogs, forums)

The backbone (or bulliten board, mounting frame)
of any project is the web site. Many sites are
free and use only moderate ads to promote themselves.
In most cases, a bit of googling with 

      "free web sites" 

will yield sufficent sites. Note thought that some
sites ONLY allow html (web pages), JPG and GIF 
(images) to be placed. This excludes movies, M/S
Word DOC's or M/S PowerPoint, etc. Some sites can
be used to host these (eg, YouTube, FaceBook, etc)
and then LINKS from your main web site to those
can be set up.

If funding is available, some sites can provide an
upgrade or better services; eg, pair.com or webs.com

Also, there are free community bulliten board sites;
one of the best is:  ning.com

It's important that students learn how to create
their own blogs, web pages, and upload content 
as well. This develops modern e-skills that create
and supplement traditional portfolios.

{  

Digital Camera/Scanner

Note that a digital camera (which can also be used 
to record sound) or a scanner can be used to 
"snap shot" work as it progresses. These can be of
two forms: 
               Rough and Refined.

Both have their uses - especially large amount of 
rough material/recordings can be used in a collage
fasion to "round out" a refined presentation. In
film work these are things like close ups and
cut-away shots that are then blended with the
main action/dialog compoents to break up the
rhythm and/or to create tension or relaxation
as required to change the pace or focus of the
work. 

 


Smart Boards

A recent development is the so-called "smart board".
It is essentially a white board that can detect things
drawn on it, and then relay them to a computer. If
such a purchase is not possible at the present time,
then a plain chalk board or white board may be used
and then photo's taken of it with a digital camera.
Ideally, the camera would be set to continuous (movie)
mode and braodcast in real-time or streamed video into
the net.

Regardless, even a forum/e-buliten board system can 
accomplish much.

The synergy comes from real-time interaction (R/T I/A)
between participants that approximates one-on-one 
working as much as possible. 

An advantage of vid'd or other kinds of recorded "tapes"
is that they may be played back later for further study.
It also provides some feedback to the maker of the tape.
Futher review of the tape, can parallel the classical
"peer review" of a written or performed work.

Again the general comments concerning meetings and the
learning experience apply.  -[Meetings]-
                            (those notes here)









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               {    

Methods
                   
See also:  -[Different Models]-
   




Changing the Maths Cur.





   

  -[Change of Context]- (c of c)

  -[Hanover]-

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  -[Programmed Learning]- (nobody here in this maze, but just us mice!)


   


Links

In this section:  {<><>}  
                  {Teaching Maths}
  
                  {Mathematical Proofs} (and such)




Teaching Maths
 
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    -[www: TheMathLab . com]-
        Interesting site with lots of "get invovle"
          activities for maths
        In the "teachers only", some good guidances
           Games 
           mini-lectures (five mins each of: Talk, Try the idea, Report!) 
           boardwork 
           groupwork 
           individual work 
           projects 
           videos 
           writing assignments 
           discovery lessons 
           computer practice 
           Internet research 
           spreadsheet explorations 
           humorous stories 
           lively historical anecdotes and facts 
           one on one peer tutoring 
           experiments 
           timed drills 
           self checking worksheets with answer banks 
 

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     the sites www.coursecompass.com/ and MyMathLab.com
         seem pretty $-oriented "improve that grade!"

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Mathematical Proofs
(and such)

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    -[Goldberger's paper on why proofs are necessary]-