Week 7: How can 3D printing change the way we think about education?

3D printing.  How will it change education?  Here are some amazing facts about 3D printing.  We have the technology and ability to print food, skin, kidneys, limbs, cars, houses, and guns.  (Federico-O’Murchu, 2014)  Let's take food for instance.  According to Tom Rawstorne from the Daily Mail in the U.K., there is a company that is …

Week 7 :What are the rules for your makerspace?

After giving some thought to my project and the related materials and tools necessary to construct a pinhole camera, I've determined that my makerspace will not have that many tools that would be considered life threatening.  But exercising good judgement in using the available tools is vital.  There are other components of a makerspace that …

Week 6: Refection

This week's assignment of actually supplying a maker space and funding the materials is making this classroom project a reality.  One of the questions I had before writing a response was to ask if this maker space is related to our proposed project a few weeks ago.  My project was making a pinhole camera.  After …

Week 6: Reflection

It's been an interesting week to view other peoples' view on coding.  I know there is a national push to teach coding in school, and I am adamant about making this a reality.  There are so many positive learning benefits to teach coding in school.  My personal experience with coding in high school has affected …

Week 6: What are the compelling arguments both for and against computer coding in schools?

The essential question of the week will be difficult to answer because I am a coder.  I will try to respond in an unbiased fashion.  My first experience with coding was my senior year in high school back in 1982. Yikes!  I learned BASIC.  I think I was the only one that was enrolled in …

Week 6: What stuff will you stock your making space with, what’s the cost, and how will you fund it?

In week four I described a project that I would like my students to work on.  The prompt was "Make a pinhole camera that you can use to take a photo."  When I have assigned this project in the past, I didn't have a maker space in mind, but relied on students to use materials …

Week 5: Reflection

Teaching and learning.  The one constant in this process is that it is constantly evolving.  I suppose there are thousands of research articles and studies done in this field.  It was interesting to see a definition of teacher identity.  I knew there was phrase that describes “Teachers know; teachers believe; teachers feel; teachers participate; teachers …

Week 5: Reflection

It's been a fun week to find out the different Internet of Things (IoT) devices our class would develop.  I really think my life would be easier as a math teacher if there was a system in place that would grade and assess my students.  I could then focus on helping individual students that have …

Week 5: Design an object that could be classified as belonging to “The Internet of Things” and describe how it could contribute to your classroom.

I have never heard the term Internet of Things (IoT), but it is definitely an emerging technology.  Kobie defines it as connecting devices over the internet, letting them talk to us, applications, and each other. (2015)  I was amazed at the reach of IoT devices.  Here is a graphic created by CB Insights of nine …

Week 5: What’s the relationship between teaching and learning?

Ah, the old age question of education.  There's an inside saying among the math teachers at our school... we can teach students things, but we can't make them learn!  We jokingly relate it to the "you can lead a horse to water" idiom, but we would like to change the phrase "but you can't make …