Enhancing Middle School Math With Graphing Technology

Megan Lierman

Corban College

meganlierman@corban.edu

Oregon Technology in Education (OTEN) Spring Conference
April 22, 2006

Materials

Total Cost: $993.00

• Texas Instruments TI-73 Explorer Teacher Pack $660.00

§ 10 TI-73 Explorer Calculators

§ 3 Guidebooks

§ Poster

§ 10 unit-to-unit-cables

• TI-73 Explorer ViewScreen Calculator Package $300.00
• Discovering Mathematics: Grades 7 & 8 (ISBN: 1-886309-24-8) $ 16.00
• Carrying Tote For Ten TI-73 Explorer Calculators $ 17.00

Summary of Unit:

This unit is designed to teach advanced 7^th grade students about Coordinate Geometry including location of ordered pairs, finding area of geometric figures on a coordinate plane, and transformations of geometric figures on a coordinate plane.

Role of Technology:

In the first section of this unit (days 1 to 3), students learned about the location of ordered pairs on a coordinate plane. The graphing technology was used to plot ordered pairs to form the outline of a dolphin on the screen. The second section of this unit (days 4-6) are about finding the area of geometric figures on a coordinate plane. The Geoboard Application on the graphing calculators was used in this section to show another method for finding the area of geometric figures. The last section of this unit was on transformations (days 7-14) such as translations, rotations, and reflections. The Geoboard Application was again used to show the results of transformations on geometric figures. The ViewScreen allowed me to model the application of the technology to the students.

Unit Outline:

§ Day 1: Notes on Coordinates for Location

§ Day 2: “Battleship”

§ Day 3: Character Mapping

§ Day 4: Notes on Coordinate Geometry

§ Day 5: Coordinate Geometry Exercises

§ Day 6: “Get To The Point”

§ Day 7: “Get To The Point” Part 2

§ Day 8: Notes on Transformations

§ Day 9: Transformations Exercises

§ Day 10: “Go With The Flow”

§ Day 11: Translations/Rotations Activity

§ Day 12: “Turn Around”

§ Day 13: Latin Squares

§ Day 14: Latin Squares

Italicized lessons specifically use TI-73 Graphing Technology.