Web 2.0 Resources

This week's assignment introduced new methods of creating resources through technology to present in the classroom. For this assignment, I chose a unit on Financial Algebra to discuss. This is a topic that I've touched on this year in inclusion with my AOD Students and in Algebraic Connections. I really feel this is a  great unit that should be taught to all students.

I began by making a web on bubbl.us. As you can see, there is a lot to be discussed about in this unit. I think that making a web can be useful, more so in planning the delivery of the curriculum. I would use this in preparation, probably not in math instruction, however. I do think that I may use this with the kids on my case load for English assignments.

Glogster, though probably one of the more painfully long assignments to do, was one of my favorite end products. Check out my glogster here! I focused on credit cards and interest rates for this particular assignment. I really like that the glogster is almost like a flyer and very eye catching for the user. I hope that students would find this interesting. Like I said, I loved the end product but found making a glogster to be tedious, at least for a first time user. I think it would be very beneficial to have students make an assignment on Glogster and would like to see my students do this some time.

Next, I made a video that briefly introduced topics discussed in Financial Algebra on Animoto.Check out my video! I think that this would be a nice way to present a new unit to the class. I also was very interested to find how easy it can be to find Creative Commons images when doing this assignment. I would really like to see what features are available in a paid membership version of Animoto, and think that it would be nice to make longer videos in Animoto with the paid membership. This may be something I come back to in the future to use again.

For my free choice, I decided to go to ClassTools.net and make two games for my students. If you would like to play dustbin, click here. I used information about Simple and Compound Interest Formulas for the Dustbin Game. You can check out the arcade games by clicking this link. I included different questions from the Financial Algebra unit in this game. I really liked making the games, though I don't know how well they would work in other units of math. The games were really easy to make - most of the time spent on this was with thinking of material to be used.

All in all, I would say that my favorite tools were Animoto and Glogster. I would love to use them myself, or have my students use these resources in the future.