Technology: Good or Bad?

Comment

Comment by Andrea B. Minor on March 11, 2011 at 7:08pm

I absolutely love teaching/empowering my students to use the graphing calculator. However, the TI-Inspires are not so enjoyable for me or my students. Go figure!

Comment by Angie Rogers on March 10, 2011 at 10:53pm

I think that we live in a world where technology is at our fingertips, literally!! I think that it is so important for us to incorporate technology, but, I also think that it is really important for students to know how to do things without that technology. Since I am a  special education teacher, I think about some of my students that really struggle with basic math facts, and think that for them, they will need to rely on that technology and they really need to know how to do their calculations on their calculators.  It is something that really is double sided and has its place in the classroom, and yet....we still need to make our students as self sufficient as possible...

Comment by Arthur Weiss on October 17, 2010 at 7:45pm

There is some research out there that supports the use of graphing calculators to help underachieving students. It basically shows how intermediate algebra students in a college setting performed better on class assessments than students who did not use a graphing calculator.

The part of the study that I found interesting is that the graphing calculator was more helpful to the "C" level student than the "B or above" level student.

I've used this data when teaching scatterplots on the TI for a few years.
Click here to see my activity with this data
Click here to go to the ERIC page to download the study

Comment by Andrea B. Minor on October 16, 2010 at 9:00am

Yes John, I realize that calculators can be an aid to our struggling students, however they need to be able to tell the calculator what to do in order to get the correct results!

Comment by J Cunningham on October 16, 2010 at 7:36am

I do agree with John that you can create an environment that fosters the growth of number sense and big ideas.... Technology is just a tool.. teachers create the environment...

Comment by J Cunningham on October 16, 2010 at 7:33am

I teach 9th grade algebra, like you. :-) And I find that students who can't function without a calculator usually can't function with it either. They lack a fundamental number sense that is acquired in the formative years. I don't know why this fundamental number sense is lacking... is technology to blame, or other factors?....

Comment by John Pizzo on October 16, 2010 at 12:56am

could technology serve as a tool to aid those students who lack the basic skills while they strive to learn the big ideas in algebra and beyond?