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ResourcesHow Can Technology Be Integrated into Math and Science Curricula?
Since technology is always tied with curriculum, the first step for integrating technology into math classes is to look at the standards. Once it's clear what we want students to know and be able to do, we can look at ways technology tools might enhance their experience. The rest of this section refers to work done at the national level. If you correlate these ideas with your state and local standards, you will see how the resources suggested here can support classroom work.
At the Web site for the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM), standards for children in preschool through second grade include encouraging parents and other caregivers to engage young children in thinking about numbers, counting, and other early math concepts in casual, easy ways.
"Adults can foster children's mathematical development from the youngest ages by providing environments rich in language and where thinking is encouraged, uniqueness is valued, and exploration is supported."
Play is children's work. Adults support young children's diligence and mathematical development when they direct attention to the mathematics children use in their play, challenge them to solve problems, and encourage their persistence.
An example of an activity that applies this standard, Spoonytunes, found on the NCTM Web site, offers an estimation problem for young children. In this activity, children are challenged to estimate the number of spoons in their silverware drawers at home, then go home and count them. Graphs could be built of estimates and actual counts for different kinds or sizes of spoons (say, metal, plastic, mixing, or measuring spoons, or teaspoons and tablespoons).
NCTM states, "A major goal in grades 3-5 is the development of computational fluency with whole numbers. ... This set of Standards reinforces the dual goals that mathematics learning is both about making sense of mathematical ideas and about acquiring skills and insights to solve problems."
For children in the later elementary grades, the site suggests an Internet Mathematics Excursion such as Accessing and Investigating Data Using the World Wide Web: Part 1 National Population Projections. This detailed lesson is tied directly to standards, and includes links to Web sites, handouts, and data to support the lesson.
At the middle school level, NCTM's Principles and Standards for School Mathematics proposes an ambitious and rich experience that both prepares students to use math effectively in their lives outside school and lays a solid foundation for the study of math in high school. "Students are expected to learn serious, substantive mathematics in classrooms in which the emphasis is on thoughtful engagement and meaningful learning."
The NCTM Web site also provides links to selected Web resources such as the Copernicus Education Gateway's Women in the Olympic Arena lesson. Another NCTM link, Figure This! Math Challenges for Families, offers a large number of challenges students and other family members can work on together.
For high school students, NCTM standards state, "In grades 9-12, students should encounter new classes of functions, new geometric perspectives, and new ways of analyzing data. They should begin to understand aspects of mathematical form and structure, such as that all quadratic functions share certain properties, as do all functions of other classes -- linear, periodic, or exponential. Students should see the interplay of algebra, geometry, statistics, probability, and discrete mathematics and various ways that mathematical phenomena can be represented. Through their high school experiences, they stand to develop deeper understandings of the fundamental mathematical concepts of function and relation, invariance, and transformation."
A lesson plan titled Interpreting the "Real-Life" Meaning of Graphical Representations of Data addresses algebra and data analysis and probability standards through eight lessons.
Since technology is always tied with curriculum, the first step for integrating technology into science classes is to look at the standards. Once it's clear what we want students to know and be able to do, we can look at ways technology tools might enhance their experience. The rest of this section refers to work done at the national level. If you correlate these ideas with your state and local standards, you will see how the resources suggested here can support classroom work.
Produced in 1995 by The National Research Council, the National Science Education Standards is a document that outlines science education. However, the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA) is quick to point out that the Standards does not present a curriculum or a set of lesson plans, it offers "goals for achievement that are appropriate for all members of the science education community." The document talks about six aspects of science education:
- Standards for science teaching
- Standards for professional development for teachers of science
- Standards for assessment in science education
- Standards for science content
- Standards for science education programs
- Standards for science education systems
How do you integrate technology into your science curriculum? Many Web sites can help you begin. Here are just a few:
1. NSTA: The organization provides resources including links to activities that combine classroom and online sharing of data and other information. Here are some highlights:
- Astronomy with a Stick: This lesson engages students in units that familiarize them with tracking shadows, observing and quantifying the change in daylight hours, and creating models of the Earth's latitude-longitude grid.
- Galapagos Education Site: A collaboration between NSTA and the Smithsonian Institution, this site comes complete with links to a Galapagos Guide, classroom investigations, and resources for teaching evolution.
- The 1999 Toshiba/NSTA Laptop Learning Challenge: This site includes several lesson plans for K-12 students, including the following high school lessons: Controlling Robots, Community Cartography, Aquatic Field Data, Mapping by Satellite, and Amusement Park Physics, which can be downloaded as PDF files.
- Forensics in the Classroom: For middle and high school students, NSTA has teamed up with Court TV to produce forensics lessons that cover a number of standards. After signing up for the free lessons, teachers and students have access to the detailed plans, along with links to resources to further their study. Each lesson presents an intriguing challenge or problem, and students then learn about specific steps they can take to solve the mystery. For example, in The Cafeteria Caper, students will conduct an enzyme test as well as test hair and blood for DNA to figure out who trashed the cafeteria.
2. The National Educational Technology Standards for Students (NETS): On this Web site you will find the table of contents from ISTE publication NETS for Teachers: Preparing Teachers to Use Technology, which has lessons for grades K-12 that integrate technology into the curriculum. The lessons can be downloaded as PDF files or viewed on the Web. The science lessons you will find include:
3. The Nature of Water Power: The Nature of Water Power is a thematic science unit appropriate for Grades 6 through 8. It lists the Standards Alignments for the states of Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington.
4. The Science Education Gateway: This site belongs to a national consortium of scientists, museums, and educators working together to bring the latest science to students, teachers, and the general public. The Lesson List lets you "Go To" a lesson such as Auroras: Paintings in the Sky or Martian Sun-Times.
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