On the Trails

I have been collecting web resources for many, many years. I use these resources when I help strategize learning experiences with teachers and students. Below is a typical middle school scenario:

A math teacher wants to do a lesson that addresses this performance indicator (PI) and question type:

PI: Apply percents to: Tax, Percent increase/decrease, Simple interest, Sale price, Commission, Interest rates, Gratuities

?: Sarah earned a 4% commission on all of her sales in March. Her total sales were $80,000 in March. How much money did she earn from commissions?

The teacher chose this PI because he/she looked at the student data from the previous year and this particular question (PI) was an issue with many students in his/her previous class. In an ideal world – this teacher would be doing formative assessments and not waiting for a summative, New York State assessment – but that is another blog post.

So the teacher would like to use web resources in his/her lesson that help students calculate percentages. The teacher has formatively assessed their students and found out that their students are having a hard time changing percents into decimals. So the teacher wants from me – the Educational Computing Strategist:

• a practice site
• they want an explanation that the kids can refer to
• they want to be able to have their kids explain how to calculate percentages (for this, I suggest their blog).

So, I visit our curriculum wiki (the one you are going to contribute to, looking for web resources that address the above performance indicator. I then share what I find with the teacher and they post the web resource links I give them to their (ever growing) learning center on their web page. It is my hope that someday, they will not need me!

So, you can help all of us by finding GREAT web resources to teach with. If you like a web resource, you will feel comfortable teaching with it and thus give others the courage to try to teach with it to.

So, take a look at my del.icio.us library and find some web resources that you like.

The next post will explain what to do about adding them to our curriculum wiki.

If you have any questions thus far, post them as comments – you can post anonymously if you wish.