#pitfalls of technology

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Technology can be a pain in the neck

Technology can be a pain in the neck

The view from my Florida “office.”

For good or for ill, technology has impacted nearly every aspect of our lives.

Robots began to invade the workforce assembly lines when I was a youngster. Never could I have imagined how far they would be integrated into our daily lives. Technology is advancing so rapidly that as soon as you buy a new cell phone, for example, it becomes obsolete.

We are so…

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[pedagohgee]

Notes from Math 100

A couple of thoughts from my chapter test review today: 

1. When I give my students time to work on their certifications (homework assignments through a computer program called Hawkes Learning Systems), I tell them to raise their hand if they have a question and I will come help. At least half of the questions I get are students asking "Did I do this right??" That is my least favorite question. I don't mind answering it occasionally, but I would much prefer it if they had the confidence in themselves and their skills to try out their answer without the hand-holding step. I also hope to help them cultivate the resilience to keep trying despite or maybe because of an incorrect answer. Mistakes are a part of the learning process and as such need to be accepted rather than scorned, avoided, or worse, used as an excuse to punish oneself. 

The math software I'm using has basically a "three strikes you're out" type system for the homework. If students miss a certain number of problems in the certification, they have to start the entire thing over regardless of how close they were to completion. For the sake of efficiency and their own motivation, most of my students want to be sure that the answer they type into the box is correct so they don't have to see the dreaded red X icon and possibly have all of their work up to that point thrown out the window. And I can definitely understand this. But I'm convinced that my time and theirs would be better spent on having the boldness to make mistakes and the drive to continue learning anyway. 

2. When a frustrated student demands of me when she is going to have to use the skills we are working on in her life, (right now we are working with using the order of operations with fractions and mixed numbers), I'd really like to have a better answer than "never." I half-assed something about algebraic reasoning and persistence. But I need a better answer. Education without relevance is practically dead. 

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