Matching Activity using Hot Potatoes

By Jon OaksAug 13, 2012
This week I was asked about an easy way to make an interactive activity in which students would be able to match equations with graphs or descriptions with graphs.  I knew that there had to be an easy way to do this that didn’t involve having to know anything about java or any other type of code.  My first thought was to use Sharendipity.  However, that didn’t work out because I couldn’t figure out how to build a game from scratch in which I would be able to upload my own images of graphs and equations. After a week-long search,…
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Observations on Plotting Points in Pre-Algebra

By Jon OaksMay 14, 2012
Disclaimer:  Some of this might seem very, very obvious.  But sometimes it's good to state the obvious, right? This semester I decided to teach plotting points differently than I have in the past. I started the lesson by handing each student a piece of graph paper and a ruler.  Yes, I know college students should probably be accountable for bringing their own supplies to class. However, in this particular class we spend a grand total of 2 class periods discussing graphing.  I do not believe it is worth it for these students to buy a pack of 100 sheets of graph…
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Web-Based Tool to Quickly Make Venn Diagrams

By Jon OaksMay 14, 2011
I just learned about a free web-based tool called 'Crappy Graphs' (http://crappygraphs.com/user_graphs/makecrap.php) that if you're not trying to make a crappy graph, would actually be quite useful to quickly make a Line Graph or a Venn Diagram to illustrate concepts in logic, set theory, etc.  I've included a few examples of what it can do. See the full gallery on Posterous After note:  You may want to check out http://grapholite.com/ as well.
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A Paper Idea for Learning to Plot Points

By Jon OaksFeb 07, 2011
First of all, congratulations to Maria Andersen for winning the Mindomo MindMap of the Week.  Now, let's document my journey over the next 30 minutes or so after I started hunting around the Play and Learn Mind Map.  And this is truly interesting, as it might show you exactly how I think sometimes. I started with the Play and Learn Mind Map, which led me to the Playing to Learn Math Mind Map (Also by Maria Andersen). I noticed that the Playing to Learn Math Mind Map (a work in progress) did not have any links to games about logarithms (although there…
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Maps and Mathematics

By Jon OaksDec 18, 2010
Just a couple of ideas that I think are interesting ways to approach the idea of using Maps to teach Mathematics.  I really think that the Map Application is a good away to introduce ordered pairs because students have to find locations such as A1, B2, etc., where there is a distinct order.  If you start getting students in the habit of thinking that the first coordinate is a letter and the second coordinate is a number, then it isn't as difficult to move to the first coordinate being the x-value and the second coordinate being the y-value.  And as…
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Math Vocabulary Becomes Art

By Jon OaksDec 16, 2010
I was researching the best way to use maps to introduce the topic of ordered pairs to a beginning algebra class, when I stumbled upon something totally different, and totally unique:  A website called Wordle that takes text and turns it into JAVA created art.  I actually threw the RSS feed for this website into their art generator (a wonderful option, by the way), and the results are below.  Immediately, my wheels started spinning about how to use this in a math class, and viola!  The nice people who write the Ed Tech 4 Math Blog Technology & Software For Teaching Math already…
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