International Webcams - I Want To See What I'm Getting For My Money

Although this webcam doesn't have anything to do with math directly math is still involved. When students start thinking about college they there are a variety of qualities that have to be explored and looked into. Aside from the college having the major you are interested in you want to know what it looks like and the feel of it when school is in session. After all you or your parents are paying for the best education and the best experience you could get. Most students are able to visit the colleges they find attractive, but when you're just exploring the international webcam come in very handy. The following link is to a webcam from the University of Miami:
http://www6.miami.edu/webcams/. It looks beautiful! If I were choosing this as one f the colleges I wanted to attend and I couldn't go there physically to see it the webcam is great. After all tuition is crazy nowadays and you want t know what you're getting for your money. Math is always around us !

Geography and Math

Geography doesn't just address where a place is located. There are many aspects that are addressed when referring to the geography of a place such as, history, demographics, economy, religious institutes, emergency services, education, references, external links, etc. There are numerous amounts of math being used everyday through many of the aspects listed above. For example, when looking at the demographics of Thornwood, NY it addresses how many square miles the town is along with how many people reside there and how many families reside there. There are certain percentages of how many of families have children under 18 living with them. You can figure out the exact number. It's wild! Math is definitely evident in the economy aspect of Thornwood. Review the site and give an example of where math is used pertaining to the economy.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thornwood,_New_York

Middle School Math Content

The following link contains an outline of the eighth grade curriculum. It includes the core content, processing skills and activities (which is where you can see how math is useful in everyday life), what can be incorporated into the lesson other than math (Science, Art, English, etc.), evaluation techniques, and technology components.

http://www.min201.org/*DetailedCurriculumPDF/G8%2007-08%20Course%203%20Math%20(7th%20high).pdf

Math Socialization

A social space is comprised of a couple different things. One type of social space is a chat room. Some chat rooms could be considered My Space or Facebook, but a great deal of parents don't want their kids involved in those social spaces due to the dangers they could create. There are all kinds of predators out there and the computer seems to be one of the easiest ways to lure kids in. I found a chat room that deals with homework help. I know kids like to socialize about things other than homework, but I realized that when kids go to do their homework they have questions that I'm not there to answer, or their parents don't know how to do, or that tutorials don't address directly. Therefore, this homework help chat room could be really beneficial and it's safe. If you decide to try it let me know what you think. Enjoy!

http://math-and-reading-help-for-kids.org/homework_help_chat_room.html

Tutorials for Math

Learning a topic in class and having your teacher there to assist you when you need it is great. However, sometimes trouble arises when you go home and have to practice problems on your own. Of course you have your notes to follow, but if you don't understand the concept it's hard to understand what it is you're doing. In seventh grade one of the on going problems are integers. Even though we practice and use them from the beginning of the year it is the one topic that students seem to get students all the time. i found a great tutorial link that explains integers very clearly. One thing that is great about it is the kids can play it over and over again until it sinks in. Another fantastic quality is if the parents are trying to help they can watch and learn as well. I have many parents who want to help their kids, but have trouble with the math themselves. So this is not only good for the kids, but for the parents as well. Integers are used in everyday life. Think about the temperature. In the summer we have high temperatures like 85 degrees Fahrenheit and in the winter we have temperatures that are -10 degrees Fahrenheit. Check out this site and tell me where else integers are used in real life. There are other topics that the tutorials address as well, such as fractions. So feel free to explore those and let me know where you could use any of them in real life too. When you go to the site go to the links for Virtual Library Home. Click the Science and Math link. Scroll down to the bottom and click on Visual Math Learning. Next click on Lessons. Now you can choose whichever lesson you'd like to explore. Have fun!

http://www.math.fsu.edu/Virtual/

Musical Math

Math is definitely involved in learning about music. It is involved with counting beats and measures when reading music. I know a great deal of my students are in band and whether you know it or not every time you go to band you are practicing math at the same time. You may not be writing equations or solving problems, but you are using basic math skills to stay on tempo. I found this link that explains how music can be incorporated into math lessons. One of the lessons for the seventh grade discusses musical intervals, frequency, and ratios. Another lesson for the eighth grade addresses keys and scales. It's very interesting to see how musical aspects are built-into math. Have a look for yourself!

http://cnx.org/content/m11638/latest/

Mathematical Art

Just like math and science go hand in hand a great deal of math and art go hand in hand. I know this blog focuses on math used everyday, but some math stems from history. The website I found, http://mathforum.org/~sarah/shapiro/, addresses how math was used back in the day. The ancient Egyptians used to use string for a great deal of their math. This website consists of a great deal of links that include lesson plans that contain ancient Egyptian methods of how to do math. One of the links within the site is"Family Math", which describes a lesson dealing with measurement and using string to measure. It's fascinating. Have a look and tell me your thoughts.