GoalsInterests

Say hello to your group members in your small group discussion forum. Share the interests you developed and explored in Module A and come up with a name for the group. What are your goals for this assignment? What sparks your interest?  I am interested in looking at how students from different cultural and linguistic backgrounds approach the use of technology in an English only mathematics classroom teaching a Canadian curriculum and the challenges this poses for teachers. First, they need to know more about their academic history. What background knowledge of math do they have, how were they taught the concepts that they do know? Second, teachers have the problem of communicating with students in a language that they do not understand. I am interesting in researching cultural and linguistic differences in the teaching and learning of mathematics, and how integrating technology into the math classroom can help bridge these issues and create a learning environment that caters to the diverse needs of a multicultural classroom. Phil C to Group: I just finished writing my paper on "teaching math and science to a unified classroom with multiple technologies using an inquiry-based approach". It is a long winded title but it was a very interesting subject. Basically I am interested in how classrooms that are unified (highly diverse) get segmented by a single instructor. I was looking at ways that technology could assist so that a single instructor using an inquiry based approach could use all sorts of technologies from robots to computer to smart boards ... to split up the class based on "groups" or individual student needs. The classrooms that I studied had students with disabilities, ESL, autism, etc so they were fairly complex.

I am not necessarily suggesting that this be our topic ... but it might be interesting to look at how different "communities" or populations of students can use technology to learn math and science.