Bring Charity to the Classroom

In this day and age, there are so many ways you can bring the world to your classroom. Why not bring charity?



I have been helping in an Algebra lab class to get help students get motivated. The focus is first to get to know the students. Second, make daily lessons engaging. Now, I am going to use charity:water to help the students care about the world around them. They will raise money with their efforts in math to help others in need get clean water.

Our plan is the following: students will set goals for their test grades. They will go to their family and friends and ask them to commit to donate to the charity set up for the class if the student meets their goal. All donations will be handled by the donors--they can make their own donations online once the results are in. All because of technology. What can be more motivating than helping someone else?

Update: The students watched the video above and are feeling empowered. I heard sighs from the students and "awws" for the babies in the video. They already care and they've never even met them. They've even got a donor that donated $40 so far and they loved it! I'm excited for these students who will have to opportunity to improve themselves while helping someone else. Thank goodness for technology and great teachers! :)

Donate here!
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Mythbusters Waterslide

I got sent this video and loved it! Then...I saw that Mythbuster's link. Even cooler. Math. Is. Powerful. :)







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AMDM and Prezi

A student presentation about the affects of alcohol on family. This project was for AMDM (Advanced Mathematical Decision Making) during the Statistics unit. Great job done by them and their teacher!



Here's a link to the Prezi: AMDM-Family Affects of Alcohol

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Basketball Throw on Geometer's Sketchpad 5

I got sucked in to this basketball problem and now there's a follow-up. Really, Dan? What the heck, what are you making me? I'm a flippin' math workhorse now.

Anyway, from the first problem, I was inspired to create this file. Amber Smith actually helped me make it. Without her expertise, this file would not exist. Thanks, Amber! Enjoy the GSP5 file; it has a picture of the original basketball shot in the background of a coordinate plane. When you press Shoot the ball, the basketball will move along the curve set by the parameters a, b, and c that you input. Perhaps an assessment could be, "Does he make it?" or "Will your regression make it?" Share this file with your kids if you're at a 1-to-1. Good luck and happy shooting.

Geometer's Sketchpad 5: Basketball Throw

Now...moving onto the next basketball problem. Thanks, Dan..



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Create a Facebook page Video

I've had some requests on how to do this for your classes; here you go!


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My Buddy

Get a Voki now!

Animoto Video Introductions

Free for Educators! Simply fill out the form here and enter your school website and you get a confirmation code to use this site for FREE (it may take a few days to get your code, so do it NOW in time for Day 1 of school!). It's the best ever--easy as heck to use, and best of all, YOU DON'T HAVE TO WORRY ABOUT MUSIC! Animoto has an extensive list of music that have been pre-copyright-approved so you don't have to hassle with finding royalty free, licensed for reuse, music files. Of course, you should use either your own images or images licensed for reuse. Try Flickr (you can search by "creative commons license" in the advanced search option).
I have attached a video I created in a little over an hour and most of if was because I got picky about pictures. I can't help it! Anyway, it would be a great idea to use one of these to introduce yourself to your students instead of A)not introducing yourself at all or B) just talking about yourself. They'll respect you more if you use their media--a music video! The style and transitions are all done by Animoto; you just upload pictures and/or video and pick what music you want. Voila! Enjoy!


Here's the link from Animoto's website. Mrs. Julizza Holub